Future Rust
by ohmyenemy
Summary: "Damn, kid, that's a shiner," he remarked, watching as she pulled herself up onto his level and took a seat beside him, letting her backpack drop beside her with a surprisingly heavy clang. "You have a run in with Mike Tyson?"
1. Nebraska

Shane made his way to the fire escape as soon as he heard his front door close behind her. Mary Anne was her name. She wasn't necessarily his type but the pickings were slim with what was going on in the city. Curfews were being enforced strictly and he was forced to find a woman that actually lived in his apartment building if he wanted to see her. He enjoyed the silence once she had gone. The woman always talked too damn much, but they always did.

He finally felt like he could breathe as he climbed onto the fire escape. He didn't quite know why, but it was peaceful out there at night, especially with the mass power outages across the city, you could finally see the stars. He'd only been outside for a few minutes when he heard the stairs below him creaking. Cocking an eyebrow, he quickly pulled his legs back from dangling over the edge to see what idiot teenager was trying to sneak out after lockdown.

Or was it one of the people he kept hearing about? The kind that was eating other people's faces off? Maybe it'd heard his feet dangling, bumping against the stairs, but now that he was quiet …

He held his breath as the footsteps grew louder and louder, and then he saw a hand grab the top stair, before the creature pulled itself … herself up the rest of the way. The girl seemed just as surprised to see him as he was to see her, but she quickly flashed him a smile before wincing in pain. "Damn, kid, that's a shiner," he commented lightly as she pulled herself up onto his level and took a seat beside him, letting her backpack drop beside her with a surprisingly heavy clang. "You have a run in with Mike Tyson?"

"This is a Mayweather original," she said instead, gesturing vaguely to the side of her face that was swelling purple. She was small and looked to be in her late teens or early twenties, so Shane wasn't particularly worried about her presence, but he found it passing odd that she didn't seem at all concerned about being alone with a strange man on a dark fire escape in the middle of the night. "You know, since he beats women?"

"Who …" was all he managed to ask.

"You don't know who Floyd Mayweather is?" she demanded, looking almost offended until he gave her an annoyed look. "Oh, me," she said, flashing another smile. "Well I'm just your friendly neighborhood-"

"Thief," he interrupted, glancing past her to where her bag had started to spill over with prescription medications that he was pretty sure didn't all belong to her.

Shane marveled at how that smile never seemed to leave her face, and it was a nice smile at that. There was something mischievous to it, that was for sure, but she didn't seem overtly threatening. "You got me there," she agreed, propping the backpack back up and stuffing the contents that had spilled back inside it.

"You gonna tell me your name or you want me to call you Floyd?"

"Lincoln," she answered simply.

"What, like Nebraska?" he asked with a laugh as she pulled a lighter and a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket. She sent him an irritated look for laughing at her name but offered him one all the same. He shook his head and she shrugged before lighting up. "Who'd you rob?"

"No one that's gonna miss it," she assured him. "Why, you need something? Maybe something a little harder than a cigarette?"

Shane ran a hand over his face, deciding quickly that this girl must not have been a hardened criminal. It wasn't as obvious as it was for some of the guys on the force, but he still thought he gave off a pretty strong cop vibe. Of course this kind of shit happened to him when the city was in too much turmoil for it to matter. "Yeah, no thanks, I actually spent last night snorting oxycontin on my fire escape with some kids. Hate doing the same thing two nights in a row."

Lincoln sent him a lazy smile and he found himself returning it as she leaned her head back into his building, closing her eyes and taking a long drag. "You live here?" she asked, jerking her head to gesture to his apartment.

"Your passion for climbing fire escapes to buildings you don't live in is not universal," he said, smiling again when this time she laughed, looking pretty cute, he thought, when he could only see the half of her face that wasn't swollen. "Why, are you trying to decide if you still want to rob me?"

"I live two storeys up," explained Lincoln, opening her eyes to peer upward. "Bad for business if the person you rob only has to take a quick elevator ride to get their stuff back."

Shane was quiet for a long moment as he tried to put all the pieces together. "The hell you doing taking the fire escape when you live in the building?" he asked, receiving little more than a shrug in response. "The hell you doing sitting out here talking to me when your place is right there?"

"Damn, you trying to get rid of me already?"

"How long do your hang out sessions with random men on fire escapes usually last?" wondered Shane. "I know I try to keep my interactions with girls carrying a backpack full of stolen prescription medication to under ten minutes."

"Judge us not equally," she warned him. "Some of us may be worth upwards of fifteen minutes."

"You not wanting to go home got anything to do with this?" he asked, reaching over. She flinched as he ran a cold thumb across her tender cheek bone gently. "Boyfriend do this to you?" The flash of annoyance that crossed her face was answer enough for Shane. "Ah, the old man," he amended.

"If anybody asks, it was Floyd Mayweather," she said, leaning away from him and out of his reach, though not in an obvious way. "Way cooler story."

Shane ran his hand through his hair, feeling irritated. He had come to the fire escape for peace, not to find a new project to work on on his night off. "You want me to talk to him? I'm a-"

"Cop," she supplied, causing Shane to send her a surprised look now. If she knew he was a cop, why the hell was she talking to him the way she had been? "You've talked to my daddy about thirty times, Officer Walsh. I expect you left as lasting of an impression on him as he did on you." He was at a loss for words now. Not only did she know he was a police officer, but she knew him by name. Had he really seen her before? He knew he'd taken a few domestic violence cases in his building, but thirty times? He watched as she pushed to her feet now, heaving her backpack back over her shoulders as she started climbing her final two flights of stairs. "Don't feel too bad," she called to him from a flight up. "Purple's totally my color."

* * *

He tried to blow it off. Maybe it was only an occasional thing. Maybe it just looked worse than it was. Maybe it wouldn't happen again. Maybe someone else would take care of it. A thousand maybes flew through Shane's head that night as he tried, and failed, to get some sleep. It wouldn't do, he thought to himself as he checked the clock around four in the morning. He couldn't be losing sleep over some smart mouthed brat when people were eating each other in the streets.

That meant he was going to have to deal with the problem at hand. So he wasn't surprised to find himself standing outside of apartment 805 at approximately 7:45 in the morning. He hit the door firmly, and his urgency must have been conveyed because the door was unhitching only a few seconds later. "Jesus Christ," were the words that fell from her mouth upon seeing him.

Shane found that words were failing him. Her eye had looked bad enough a few hours ago in the dim light, but it was much worse now, and looked like it was starting to swell shut. "Nebraska," he greeted. "Can I come inside?"

"Do you have a warrant?" she asked, more obstinate than he remembered. "I know … some things about my rights."

"You have the right," Shane began slowly, "to get your little ass out of my way."

Lincoln raised her chin as she looked up at him and Shane almost thought she might still tell him no. But then she took a step back and gestured for him to step inside. "Fair enough," she muttered.

Shane stepped inside the home and caught sight of a middle aged woman with cropped, gray hair stepping out of the kitchen. "Oh!" she gasped at the sight of him, throwing her hands up in surprise and dropping the plate she'd been carrying. Shane could hear a man shouting from the other room and knew he'd found his source. "Ed, honey, there's a police officer here!" The woman forced a watery smile at Shane while her husband thundered in the room.

Ed himself looked surprised at the sight of Shane, but not too surprised. "She sneakin' out again?" he grunted, sending a dirty look in his daughter's direction.

Shane glanced down at the girl and found that she didn't seem particularly impressed by her father's threatening glance, but he wasn't sure if that was her natural bravery or if the fact that he was currently standing between them had bolstered her confidence. "You mind tellin' me how that happened?" Shane asked, gesturing to Lincoln's face.

The man in front of him stood silent for so long Shane thought he might be dumb enough not to answer the question, but then his wife stepped in. "She's always been such a clumsy thing," the woman said, stepping forward to try to grab the girl and pull her back towards her family. Shane put up a hand to stop her and she skidded to a halt, flinching at the sight of his raised hand. "I'm so sorry we had to waste your time like this, I'm sure you're very busy."

"That what happened?" Shane asked her. "You fall?"

Lincoln shrugged a pair of insolent shoulders. "Well they say anything's possible," she replied, before catching her father's eye again. "Yeah, sure, I fell."

Shane hated domestic violence cases. Half the time the women never admitted anything was wrong, and the other half changed their story before he got there to handle anything. He knew they were lying, they knew they were lying, and they knew he knew they were lying. But there wasn't anything he could do about it. There was a procedure, there were rules to follow. But fuck it, Shane thought. What rules did he need to follow now? Who would they call if he broke them, the Sheriff? There wouldn't be any consequences from Rick. "She didn't fall," he told the couple.

Most people would've argued and insisted that she did. Ed Peletier was not most people. "The fuck are you gonna do about it?" he asked instead.

A heavy silence fell over the home as Carol took a step back, her eyes finding the ground as she wrung her hands together. Shane had been left momentarily speechless, but now he let out a short, bitter laugh. "You put your hands on that girl again," he began, but stopped himself from completing the threat when he saw Ed stepping around him to wrap a heavy hand around Lincoln's arm.

Shane caught him by the wrist before he could reach her and threw his other arm into the man's neck, slamming him back into the door with a sickening crack. "Ed!" his wife shouted, and he could feel tiny hands clawing at him, trying to pull him back.

"Like I was sayin'," Shane began again, feeling eerily calm as Ed flopped against him, letting out strange, guttural sounds when Shane pressed his forearm even harder into his throat. "You put your hand on that girl again and I'll beat you to death, Ed. That's what I'm gonna do about it."

xoxoxoxoxo

 **A/N:** This is not a proper story but an old roleplay I wrote with a friend several years ago. I've decided to read through and make some edits to make it a bit less embarrassing and I'm posting it here (like I have with my other old roleplays) in order to be able to read it easily in the future. Feel free to read and enjoy (or hate it) if you'd like, but set your expectations low as this was just something written for fun. :P


	2. Omaha

Lori came to join the group around the fire. It was a hot summer's afternoon and there was certainly no need for a fire, but something about it made the camp feel safer. It also likely had something to do with the fact that nearly fifteen of them were congregating around it. That made space limited but she squeezed into a spot between Shane and a younger girl she hadn't been properly introduced to yet.

She felt warm from more than the fire when Shane leaned back into his seat and spread his legs, his knee bumping into hers. She wondered if that was an invitation to slip away from the group once they had finished eating, but then she felt the girl on her opposite side elbow her from her spot on the ground. "Assert your dominance," the girl suggested, offering her the fork she'd been eating with. "Stab him in the knee."

"Gonna have to do better than that," said Shane, not sparing either woman a glance. He knew Lori wouldn't do anything and he could see Lincoln out of the corner of his eye if she actually tried to stab him with her plastic fork.

If anyone else in camp had said something like that, it would've been a problem. A big one, really, but as Lori watched Shane she quickly realized he didn't seem to particularly mind the threat. "With a bum knee, we'll have to elect a new dick to tell us what to do," said Lincoln. "My vote is for the rednecks."

Lincoln sent the rednecks in question a wave, smiling when the older man returned it with a wink. The younger brother mostly just looked annoyed that people were looking at him. "You'd be eating a lot of squirrel," said a blonde woman from across the fire. Andrea, if Lori remembered correctly, or maybe it was Amy.

"Probably just an acquired taste," Lincoln muttered with a shrug, though she looked less keen on holding an election now. It seemed like the thought of squirrel had turned the girl's stomach as she grimaced down at her half eaten plate of food before pushing to her feet and dumping the rest of it into the fire.

Lori pulled her legs in as close as she could to let the girl pass through when she seemed ready to leave, but Shane stuck his legs out further. It felt tense for a moment as the girl hesitated, staring down at the legs blocking her path, before she clambered over them, putting a hand on Shane's head to balance herself as she did. Shane watched her as she went, heading back to the RV, and Lori watched him, noting the hint of a smile on his lips when he turned back to his plate.

"What was that?" asked Lori, her voice low enough that she doubted anyone would overhear her. They were all having their own conversations.

"What was what?"

Lori scoffed, surprised he was choosing to play clueless. "That girl," she said.

"Who, Lincoln?" he asked, glancing again toward the RV again, almost as if he were longing to follow her there. "That's Carol and Ed's older girl," he explained simply. Lori waited for him to clarify, to add more, to answer the question she was clearly asking, but that was all Shane had to say.

"Are we out of salt already?" Andrea asked from across the fire, looking down at her food with a frown.

Dale was halfway to his feet when Shane beat him to it. "I'll go check," he offered, dropping his place with the remaining food down on his chair before anyone could argue.

The RV shook gently with its newest arrival and Lincoln glanced up from her book to see Shane stepping in. "Stalker," she called to him before turning her attention back to her book. It was an old Western novel, not exactly her cup of tea, but Dale's selection was slim.

"Stalker, huh," said Shane, deciding to focus his attention on the task he was sent for, looking through the cupboards for any sign of salt.

His stalking was the only reason she was alive. Not twelve hours after he'd paid a visit to her apartment the city went to shit. He'd been the one to go to her apartment, to drag her family out of the city, away from the chaos, just in time before the military started dropping napalm on the streets. "What are you looking for?"

"Salt," he answered.

"For who?"

Shane tried to remember who had asked. A woman, definitely, but he couldn't remember which. Had it been Carol? Amy? "Andrea," he guessed, figuring the answer didn't really matter all that much.

He looked to her when he heard her rustling in her backpack, the same one she'd had the first night they'd met, before pulling out a handful of salt packets from McDonald's. "I like Andrea," she said, handing them over to him.

Shane found it surprising that anyone liked Andrea, but he decided against saying so as he looked her over. The swelling on her eye had gone down and all she was left with was a deep purple mark under it. "Your face looks better."

"It's impressive you're fucking Lori with pickup lines like that," she remarked, looking down at her book again.

Shane wasn't going to dwell on how she knew about him and Lori. He thought they'd been subtle, but it only really mattered that Carl never noticed. She was avoiding looking at him for a reason. She was wearing a jacket when it was 100 degrees out for a reason. "Come here," he ordered, causing her to finally glance up. He pointed with his index finger to the floor in front of him. She sighed but quickly stood, sitting her book down to approach him.

He was quick to pull her jacket off, lifting each arm as he looked them over, feeling oddly disappointed when he didn't find the bruises he was looking for. He tilted her head next, moving her mop of curls out of the way as he inspected her neck, each side, but came up empty handed again. "Well this has been sufficiently creepy," she said. "Can I go read my book now?"

He handed her jacket back to her with a sigh, watching as she pulled it back on. It was only when she shrugged her shoulders and the hem of her shirt rose up a little too high that he found what he was looking for and quickly pulled her back to him, pushing her jacket out of the way to lift up her shirt. He exhaled loudly through his nose at the sight of her side, shades of black and green and purple spread across her skin, before she was pushing him away and pulling her shirt back down.

She could see the muscle in his jaw working as he clenched it and the vein in his forearm popping as his hand formed a fist. She searched her mind for something to say; she always had a quick, clever quip to break the tension, but she was too slow and Shane had already turned, marching toward the door. "Don't," she pleaded, launching herself between him and the door.

"The hell you mean don't?" he demanded.

"You go out there and embarrass him again like you did at my house and you think he's gonna be better? You think he was nicer to me after what you did?"

"He ain't gonna do shit if he's dead," he grunted. Shane Walsh was a man of his word and he'd promised to beat Ed Peletier to death if he put his hands on his daughter again. He could hear her still trying to reason with him and he was sure she was making valid points, but there was a ringing in his ears and all he could see was red. He raised his hand, just to reach past her and open the door, but she flinched, ducking away from his outstretched hand and throwing her own up over her head in protection. He froze now, both of them falling silent for a painfully long moment. "I wasn't …"

"I know," she said, her hands dropping quickly as she flashed an easy smile. "Hey, won't Lori be waiting for you?" She patted him lightly on the chest as she stepped around him, out of his way and back into the RV.

He caught her by the wrist before she got too far, his grip as gentle as he knew how to make it. "Lincoln," he urged.

"Officer Walsh," she replied teasingly, slipping out of his grip and taking her seat again, grabbing her book. "You shouldn't keep a woman waiting."

* * *

A week passed at their campsite without incident. At least no incidents with the walkers. The mood around camp had shifted slightly, however, as they'd lost one member and traded him for another. An upgrade, most would agree, trading in Merle Dixon for Rick Grimes. He was surveying the camp with Shane when he spotted her. "Lincoln," said Rick, surprised to find someone he actually knew among the group that Shane had assembled.

"Five ooohhh," she greeted, smiling as she sat down her book to watch the two men approach.

It was only now that he'd approached her that Rick spotted Sophia sitting beside her and quickly looked around the camp until he spotted her mother and father, as well. "Never expected to see you here," he said. "And definitely not with your family."

"What can I say, they're hard to shake," she muttered, scratching the back of her neck.

"You two know each other?" asked Shane.

Lincoln and Rick both looked at him before looking at each other with a smile. "You'll have to forgive him," said Rick. "Shane has trouble remembering women he hasn't slept with."

"It's been two weeks and he still doesn't know which one is Andrea and which one is Amy," she agreed. Rick glanced over his shoulder to where the two blonde women were preparing to go fishing. Andrea had been the one to help rescue him and Amy was much younger, but he didn't doubt Shane's inability to tell them apart. "I'm just glad he's stopped calling me Omaha."

"Lincoln!"

The sharp call from her father had her on her feet in an instant and she didn't offer either man a goodbye before trotting off to see what he wanted. "How the hell do you know a teenage girl?"

"She's 22," said Rick, as if it mattered. "We've been answering calls to that house since Sophia was in diapers. She must've been on summer break from school … you really don't remember her?" Shane grunted his response, only half paying attention as he watched the girl interacting with her father a few yards away. Rick watched his friend's hands clench and unclench, as if he were itching for Ed to so much as raise his voice at the girl. "Come on, I need to have a talk with somebody named Daryl."

* * *

Shane was decidedly more cranky than he'd ever been in the years she'd known him. That was saying something because Shane Walsh had always been very cranky. But these days he stomped around camp, his fists were always clenched, and Lincoln had a sneaking suspicion it had something to do with the return of his partner. She'd found it surprising that Rick's wife had fallen into bed or … grass, she supposed, with his partner as quickly as she had, but their forest romps had clearly come to an end.

Nothing like blue balls to make a man cranky.

She watched him as he played with Carl on the other side of the lake and then as he talked with Lori. "Lincoln?" a voice asked, calling her out of her head. She glanced around the group of women she was currently sat with, trying her best to help with the laundry. Jacqui smiled at her. "We were talking about what we miss the most from the real world."

"Privacy," she answered shortly. It was impossible to find a moment to yourself anymore, even at night. She missed having a door that she could close when she wanted to be alone. "And pizza," she quickly added, earning the smiles of the rest of the women as they continued chattering on about missing coffee and proper laundry machines.

"Lincoln!"

She flinched. His voice always cracked like a whip and she quickly sat the shirt she'd been scrubbing down, ready to stand when Andrea put a hand on her leg to keep her in place. "She's busy, Ed," the older woman drawled lazily. "Why don't you figure out how to open your own beer?" Carol took a sharp breath as she put a hand on Andrea's arm, silently willing the woman to stop. "Better yet, why don't you make yourself useful and actually help doing your own laundry?"

Andrea tossed a pair of Ed's own pants toward him only to have it hurled back in her face. "Ain't my job," he replied, taking a long drag of his cigarette.

Andrea was on her feet now as she rounded on the man. "What exactly is your job, Ed? Sitting on your ass smoking cigarettes?"

"Sure as hell ain't listening to no smarted mouthed, uppity bitch," her father responded before letting out a short, sharp whistle. "Come on, girl, you heard me."

Lincoln stood quickly, but Andrea put an arm out in front of her, forcing her to stay. "She's not a dog, Ed," she said, clearly on a roll and too angry to let the fight go despite Carol's and Amy's pleading. "And I don't think she needs to go anywhere with you."

"Don't think I won't knock you on your ass just cause you're some college educated bitch," he threatened, shoving Andrea out of the way to grab Lincoln by the arm. A different woman may have taken the shove as warning enough to stay out of it, but Andrea wasn't having it and quickly shoved her way back in between the father and daughter.

"You don't tell-"

"I don't tell you what?" he demanded, raising his hand so suddenly Lincoln almost thought he actually meant to strike Andrea before she felt the back of his hand collide with her cheek. All the words became a blur as all of the women started screaming and she could feel herself being jerked in every direction, her entire head throbbing before she was pulled just far enough and she felt a warm pair of arms wrap around her protectively.

She cracked open an eye painfully to see it was Amy who was holding her before Shane caught her eye, making a rapid approach before grabbing her father by the collar and arm, dragging him away while her mother screamed for him to stop.

It was a matter of seconds before her father was on the ground and blood was bubbling from his mouth and nose, but he didn't stop. It had only been Carol screaming at first, but Andrea, Amy, and Jacqui were quick to join in when they realized he wasn't going to quit. One punch and then another and another as her father's face quickly became less and less recognizable. Skin that had been lightly tanned was quickly turning pink and then red as his eyes swelled and then his lips. He looked like he'd been stung by a thousand bees and was spitting up little bubbles of blood by the time Shane finally stood and her mother lunged for him, sobbing and crying out apologies as she looked over the damage.

Shane stumbled back and away from the group, meeting Andrea's eye for a long moment before his gaze drifted to hers. She could only stare back at him until he turned and headed into the woods and her feet forced her to follow after him. "Shane," she called out to him when he seemed unlikely to stop on his own.

He carried on another few steps, seemingly debating whether or not he actually wanted to stop for her, before he turned around to face her, running a hand through his hair. "I know you said to leave it alone, but-"

She didn't give him time to finish as she approached him, reaching her hands up to pull him down lower, low enough for her to crash her lips against his for a second, maybe two, before he was pulling away from her and out of her reach. "Oh," she said dumbly, staring at him as he ran a hand over his face, his knuckles split and bleeding. "I saw that going differently in my mind. You just like hitting people," she realized. "That wasn't … because of me. Wow."

"You should get back to camp," he suggested.

"Sure," she said agreeably, tucking her hair behind her ear as she brushed past him. "Let me know if you need some peroxide for those knuckles," she called over her shoulder before leaving him alone in the woods.

xoxoxo

A/N: Hey, thanks for the review Romantic in Denial! I agree completely. Shane totally got the shaft in the show and he definitely deserves better. Hopefully I can give him a semblance of a better character arc that isn't just ruining his life over Lori Grimes's basic old ass.


	3. One Hundred Years of Solitude

Her head was throbbing as she got back to camp, just as the sun was setting. It was still light enough for Dale to take in her reddening cheek and freshly split lip as she came to sit around the fire with Lori, Carl, Sophia, Jim, and a handful of others. Dale also made a note of Shane returning not a handful of minutes later, his knuckles bloody, as he took to the RV for a few minutes before coming out to join the rest of them around the fire.

The rest of the women slowly trickled back in from doing laundry, all looking a bit worse for wear until he spotted Carol, sniffling loudly as she struggled under her nearly unrecognizable husband's shoulders, helping to get him back to camp.

It was quiet around the campfire that night. It wasn't the usual lighthearted conversation as they tried to make the best of the present company and situation. Things were tense and no one looked like they wanted to be the one to break the silence. That was until Amy stood up suddenly. "Where are you going?" asked Andrea, catching her sister by the arm before she could get too far..

"I have to pee," the girl grumbled. "Jeez, you try to be discreet around here …"

There were a few quiet chuckles around the camp as they watched Amy's retreating form heading into the RV. It was quiet again, nothing more than the sound of forks hitting plates and people chewing to fill the air, and then it came. A scream, loud and terrifying and incredibly close. Andrea was on her feet in an instant, throwing her plate with her half eaten fish to the ground as she rounded in time to see something taking a bite out of her sister's arm. "No!" she screamed, running haphazardly toward the pair with little but her fists to help.

But then there was another, coming toward Andrea herself now, and another and another, as all of the group quickly got to their feet. Lori grabbed Carl and ran to Shane's back, her fingers clinging to his shirt as he fired off his rifle, taking down one walker and then another, but it was becoming rapidly apparent that his gun and Dale's would not be enough to ward of the swarm that had found their camp.

Lincoln grabbed the little girl beside her, heaving her up onto her hip like she'd done when they were younger and made a run for it. She didn't have a weapon but she was fast and she knew how to keep herself safe. She could hear her mother screaming after her but she kept moving, stumbling slightly as she dodged one walker and then another before she made it back to the RV and jumped inside. She could see her father still incapacitated on the bed and reached up to pull the string that would let the stairs down.

She set Sophia down now, urging the girl to climb the stairs up onto the roof before following after her. It was complete chaos in the camp. There were two walkers on Amy now, one biting into her neck while the other still clung to her arm. Morales was swinging his bat wildly, trying to keep his family safe, and Shane had a group hiding behind him as he shot rapidly, but not quick enough as Lincoln spotted no less than four of them on the ground being eaten.

It almost seemed as if they'd be overrun when more gunshots were heard and Rick quickly came into the clearing, followed by Glenn, Daryl, and T-Dog. Within a few minutes, they'd managed to clear the area of walkers and most of the screaming died down, apart from Andrea now wailing her sister's name as she clung to the dying and then dead girl.

She stayed with her sister through the night, long into the morning when the sun had risen into the sky and the group worked on clearing up the camp.

Lincoln flinched when Daryl swung a pickaxe into a walker's head, sending blood and guts spraying up around it. "Come on," he all but snarled when he caught sight of her, gesturing for her to grab the feet of the walker while he hooked his hands under its shoulders to lift it. She could only stare at him, quickly earning his annoyance before Glenn jogged over and took her spot, grabbing the walker by its legs and helping Daryl swing it into the fire. "What, you don't want to get your nails dirty?" Daryl called after her, seemingly not satisfied that Glenn had stepped in for her.

"Shut the hell up, Daryl," said Shane, sounding incredibly tired, thought Lincoln, as he walked past them to join Rick on the outskirts of the camp.

"Y'all had this coming," grumbled Daryl. "Reap what ya sow! Left my brother for dead …" He seemed to mostly be talking to himself as most of the people around the camp were too worried about other things to pay any mind to his ranting, but Lincoln still stood there. "You stupid or something?"

"Or something," she muttered, realizing this was the first time she'd ever spoken to the man. She'd had a handful of conversations with his brother, but never with him. It wasn't the best impression she'd probably ever made on a man, but she couldn't bring herself to care. She'd never seen people die, not outside of a television program. She'd never seen a dead body but they were littered around her now. Amy had been alive the day before, fighting to protect her from her father. She could still feel the girl's arms around her, but now she was dead, and all Lincoln could think about was how … awful it smelled.

She wandered after him, willing herself to take each step, to ignore the nausea in her stomach and the throbbing in her head. Daryl looked surprised to see her grabbing the feet of the next walker he came upon, but didn't comment as they worked together to toss it on the flames.

* * *

She rode in the pickup truck with Daryl as they made their way to the CDC. Not out of any affection for the man, but she assumed the ride with him would be the quietest. She didn't want to ride with her family, she didn't want to ride with Shane. Even Andrea and T-Dog were out of the question because she couldn't look at Andrea without thinking of the sister she'd left behind.

He'd been silent for hours, at least two, as they drove. It was surprisingly peaceful driving at night, her window down as she let the cold air whip at her face. "The hell happened to you," Daryl finally asked, breaking the silence so suddenly Lincoln flinched.

She sat up straighter, looking at the man in the driver's seat. There was little more than their headlights and Shane's tail lights to illuminate his features, but she could see him chewing on his thumbnail as he glanced over at her. "What," she asked, too surprised to say anything clever.

"Your face," he said simply.

Daryl had been away when the incident at the lake had happened, but he'd seen Ed since. He'd seen Shane's knuckles. He'd seen the bruises on her mother's arms. He might not have come off as the most educated man in camp, but he wasn't stupid. "You know damn well what happened to my face," she accused him. Daryl supposed that he did. "You want me to drive?"

"You know how to drive stick?"

"Sure," she lied, figuring it couldn't be too difficult. Realistically, she didn't even know how to drive an automatic. There wasn't much need for it in Atlanta with all the public transportation and they hadn't had the money for a second car, anyway. But the highway was empty and she'd played more than her fair share of Mario Kart over the years.

"Liar," he said, spotting the bullshit from a mile away.

Lincoln shrugged, not bothering to deny it. "You'll have to teach me someday," she said noncommittally, knowing that the likelihood of that ever happening was very slim.

"Teach you how to block a punch, too," she heard him grumble under his breath, his attention back on the road now.

"Yeah," she said, leaning her head against the cracked window again. "That too."

* * *

Nothing had ever felt half as amazing as that hot shower after weeks without one. The soap stung as it slipped into every little cut on her body, but it was a good pain. The kind of pain that let her know she was still alive, she was still breathing, that those little cuts and bruises were going to start to heal.

Wearing nothing but the towel that wrapped her sopping curls on the top of her head, she spun around her room excitedly. Privacy. The thing she'd missed most from the real world. A door that closed and locked, with no one waiting outside to get in. It was the first time in weeks she didn't smell like dirt and sweat and blood and the first time in just as long that she was putting on clothes that were actually clean. Nothing that had been washed off in a lake, but pajamas that had been washed and dried in an actual machine. She smelled like heaven, like an actual human being, and only smelled better when she rubbed lotion into all of the dry parts of her skin.

It felt weird walking through the well lit, air conditioned hallways of the CDC, but felt instantly like home when she reached the Rec Room and found Carl and Sophia playing a board game together while her mother watched and Lori sat beside them, reading a book. "You won't get bored here," her mother said, smiling in greeting as she saw her older daughter enter the room. "There's enough books to keep you entertained for years."

Lincoln thought her mother might be underestimating her reading speed, but she couldn't deny that the shelves filled with books weren't an appealing sight after struggling to read through Dale's tiny collection. "Come play with us, Link," called Sophia, quickly clearing the board off despite Carl's protests so they could start a new game.

"It's late," said Lori. "We ought to be getting to bed, anyway."

"I think we might actually get some sleep tonight," Carol agreed, smiling again as she placed a hand on Sophia's shoulders to guide her out of the Rec Room and back to the bedroom they'd be sharing with her husband. Sophia grabbed her hand and tugged for her to follow but Lincoln gave her a smile instead, ruffling her hair as she let her mother lead her out of the room.

When Carl and Lori left, as well, Lincoln finally felt like she could breathe. She trailed her index finger along the dusty book spines, pleased when she saw more Classics than anything. They were classics for a reason and she'd been on a mission to try to read as many as she could in her lifetime. Her finger hesitated on 'One Hundred Years of Solitude' by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Oh, didn't that sound pleasant …

She pulled the book off the shelf and moved over to one of the couches, not hesitating in laying back on in, pulling a blanket over her legs as she cracked the first page open. She lost herself in its pages and had no idea how much time had passed when she heard a voice ask, "What's it about?"

She glanced over the top of the book to find Shane with a bottle of alcohol in his hands, perusing the bookshelves himself. Or at least he was pretending to. Lincoln had serious doubts that the man had the patience to actually sit and read a book. "Well," she began, dogearing the page she was on as she focused on him, watching the muscles in his bicep flex as he lifted his hand to grab a book on a higher shelf. "It's about this guy named Josè who falls in love with his cousin Ursula-"

"His cousin?" asked Shane, his brow furrowed as he glanced over his shoulder at her.

"It's Europe," she said, waving a dismissive hand as if that explained it. "So Ursula and Josè get married without their families' permission, but Ursula doesn't want to sleep with him-"

"Why's that?"

Lincoln sighed at another interruption. "Well they're cousins," she explained. "She doesn't want their babies to have webbed toes or a pig's tail."

"Fair enough," said Shane, setting the book he'd been looking at back down as he turned his full attention to his companion. Why bother reading a book if he could hear the synopsis from her?

"So later on Josè wins this cockfight but the guy he beats starts making fun of him because he knows his wife ain't puttin' out, so Josè gets real mad-"

"How mad?"

"Well, he kills him-"

"That's pretty mad," Shane agreed, taking a long drink of his whiskey to hide his smile when she sent him an annoyed look. Lincoln huffed, quickly deciding that Shane wasn't nearly as interesting in hearing about the book as she was in telling him about it. "Come on," he insisted, pulling the book out of her hands when she cracked it back open, intending to ignore him and continue on reading.

She squinted up at him where he was resting against the top of the couch she was laying on. "No," she finally said. "You're too drunk to appreciate the story."

"Who says I'm drunk?"

"That bottle was full when you found it," she informed him, gesturing to the bottle that had maybe two inches of amber liquid remaining in it.

"Wasn't all me," he assured her with a smile. He might not have been completely sober, but he wasn't drunk. His head was clear. "You ever had whiskey?" He reached down when she shook her head, grabbing her gently by the chin and tilting the tip of the bottle into her mouth.

She pushed him away sharply, spluttering up the liquid that was burning a trail down her throat and into her belly. "Fuck," was all she managed to say as she rubbed the back of her arm across her chin to wipe away any excess liquid, wincing at the searing pain from the cut in her lip.

"Probably an acquired taste," he told her, taking another long swig of the liquid. "Like squirrel."

"Dick," she said.

Shane's hand was still hanging down over the side of the couch, resting on the pillow beside her head. His thumb followed his eyes, brushing across the red, angry little cut on her lip. "He put his hands on you again?" he wondered. Not that the man was currently in any fit state to put his hands on anyone, but he wouldn't put it past Ed Peletier to try.

"No," she assured him, pulling her bottom lip into her mouth and away from his thumb as he moved it instead to the redness in her cheek. "You don't … have to …" she tried awkwardly, trying to think of the right words to say. "I know how you feel about Lori."

"How do I feel about Lori?" he asked, his fingers featherlight as he brushed her curls out of her face and behind her ear.

"Whhhooooooaaaaa," a new voice called from the doorway and Shane was three feet away from her in an instant. Glenn was still looking around the room at all of the video games and books, he hadn't noticed the position his two companions had been in. "Is that Pac-Man?"

* * *

A/N: The CDC had one of the weaker plotlines in the show for me. If the first season hadn't been six episodes, I think they would've spent more than like … 12 hours there, and I thought it was super cheesy they got there just as it was about to explode, so expect their time at the CDC to last at least a little bit longer than the show.

And yes, I know Ed died back during the attack, but he's very integral to Lincoln's character arc and having him die off without any sort of resolution wasn't going to work for me.

Thanks to superfaraway for the review! I'm baffled that anyone is actually reading and enjoying this, but I'm glad! And special thanks to Miss-Luny, as well! You following all three of my stories on here is definitely a huge motivator for me to keep going through the process of editing and uploading. I really appreciate it. :)


	4. Like a Water Balloon

It was all Shane could do to look away from her. To actually listen to the story Dale was telling them, something about time … about remembering time but also forgetting it? He tried not to listen whenever Dale spoke as it always ended up being some bullshit like this. But she was enthralled, her head resting on her hand as she listened to the old man go on and on and on …

"You got a thing for her?"

Shane looked at Rick with a raised brow, wondering if he could deny it. On one hand, he'd never actually openly said anything to anyone about her, but on the other … he had quite recently popped her father's head open like a water balloon for putting his hands on her and had also spent the last twenty minutes of dinner staring at her across the table. He shrugged noncommittally, taking a long drink of his beer.

"She's not your usual type," said Rick, sounding more amused than Shane had expected. He'd expected a lecture, for the why it was wrong and all of the reasons he shouldn't. He already had a list of his own compiled in his head and was almost hoping Rick had enough to add to convince him to leave it be.

"Ain't much that's usual about anything anymore," Shane reasoned, agreeing that he likely wouldn't have wasted as many thoughts on the girl had he met her in the real world. He preferred his women a bit older, a bit more well endowed and with a whole hell of a lot less baggage.

"What's going on?" asked Lori, leaning in closer to Rick. She knew damn well what was going on. The woman had ears like a hawk and Shane's jaw was clenched as he waited for the opinion he knew was coming. "Isn't she a bit young for you?"

Shane's eyes cut to her, a warning look he was grateful Rick missed. "I think it's good," the man said, earning a dubious look from both of his companions. "I do! Lincoln's a good girl, she's just been dealt a bad hand. She could use something stable in her life." Lori's eyebrows shot up at the word 'stable' being used to describe Shane. "Not that I think you'll ever get Carol or Ed's permission."

"Permission for what?" asked Carol, looking between the trio expectantly. They hadn't realized Dale's story had come to an end and the entire table was watching them now.

Rick merely smiled, looking to Shane to answer. Jackass, thought Shane. "I'm thinking we ought to start teaching people how to shoot," he said, glad he'd actually had something he needed to talk to the group about. "I'm a certified instructor. We got all these guns now, doesn't make sense only three of us can use 'em."

"I thought we were safe here," said Carol, glancing nervously between Rick and Shane.

"We are," said Rick, finally stepping in. "We are, but that's for now. There might come a time when we have to leave or when we need to make a run for supplies. It's better if we're as prepared as possible for any outcome."

While some of the people around the table looked nervous or hesitant, others looked thrilled. "Count me in," Andrea said, nodding her head. She'd had her gun from the start, a gift from her father, and she'd had to use it on Amy, but she didn't know how to deal with a moving target. She wanted to know how to kill those things so nothing like what happened at their camp would ever happen again.

* * *

Her stomach was a bundle of nerves as she snuck through the hallway that night, trying to find his room. She knew which room was her family's and which room belonged to Andrea, but she only had a vague idea for the rest of them. She could only imagine how embarrassing it would be to knock on the wrong door at 2am and she prayed that wouldn't happen as she tapped firmly on the door.

A moment passed and then another and she lost her nerve, turning sharply on her heel to run back to her room before that door could open. "Ain't you a little old to be playin' ding dong ditch?" he called after her, stopping her in her tracks.

"I'm sorry," she said, turning back around to face him, a hint of a smile tugging at her lips. "I'm gonna need a minute to process that you actually know what that is." He clicked his tongue at her, giving her an annoyed look before he started to close his door. She dove for her, barely catching it in time to keep it open. "Wait. Please."

Daryl squinted down at the girl currently blocking his door frame, trying to think of a reason why she was there. Even if he hadn't downed half a bottle of tequila, he doubted he would figure that one out. "What?"

"You said you would teach me how to block a punch," she reminded him. "I know it's late, but-" He stepped back into the room, letting the door fall open. "Really?" she asked hesitantly, still standing just outside his room.

"My other plans fell through," he grunted. "You coming in or not?"

Lincoln skittered inside, pulling the door shut behind her and giving Daryl an opportunity to size her up. She was short and skinny, with arms no bigger around than a soda can. She'd probably be better off letting Shane keep fighting her battles for her, but Daryl had spent a large portion of his own life letting Merle fight his battles for him. It wasn't a pretty sight when that person wasn't around to protect you anymore. "All right, so what's first? We gonna eat some eggs? Jog up some stairs? I'm ready for my Rocky training montage."

"If you wanna block a punch, you gotta know how to throw a punch," he said, finally sitting his half empty bottle of tequila down on his desk before gesturing for her to come closer. She took a hesitant step closer to him. "Well, come on then!"

"What, you want me to hit you?" she demanded. He threw his arms up, thinking he'd made that pretty clear. Lincoln dragged her hand down her face, realizing this had been a huge mistake. "You know, it's getting late, maybe-"

Ignoring her, Daryl walked around her so he was blocking her exit. "You want to go? Get me out of your way," he said.

This was definitely a mistake. She should've asked Shane or Rick or … anyone that wasn't a batshit crazy redneck. With a sigh, she stepped toward him, giving him a halfhearted push out of her way. He returned it with a shove of his own that had enough force behind it to send her stumbling backward, the bed knocking her legs out from under her as she landed on it. Her heart was beating like a hammer in her chest as she tried to steady herself. This wasn't her father, it was Daryl. He wasn't going to hurt her. "That," she said, pushing herself back up to her feet, "was not very nice."

"Makes you want to hit me, don't it?"

It didn't. It really didn't, but she knew he wouldn't let her leave unless she gave him something. So she stepped toward him again, placing both hands firmly on his side and pushing him again, this time making a genuine attempt, before she felt a hand on her head pushing her to the side, this time sending her stumbling into his desk.

She let out a noise of protest but he didn't give her a chance to say whatever she was going to. He didn't want her to talk. He wanted her to get mad. He wanted her to fight back. By the time she managed to get her hair back out of her face, he pushed her by the head again. She put her hands up to stop him now but he knocked them out of the way to grab her by the hair, sending her toppling onto the bed again. "There are better ways to get me into bed, Dixon," she said, lounging back on the bed with a smile that looked anything but easy.

He could see the way her hands were shaking, even as he lunged for her and she quickly rolled off the bed to the side opposite him. "You have to fight back," he insisted, baffled as to why she hadn't taken a swing at him yet. Anyone in their right mind would have defended themselves by now, but she was still looking for a way out, her eyes darting to the door and back to him.

She made a break for it, near sprinting for the door, and she almost had it before he caught her by the hair, yanking her back to him. But this time she threw a panicked elbow back and into his ribcage. He let out a startled 'oof', more surprised than hurt by it, and released his grip on her hair. But she wasn't finished with him. She spun around to face him and shoved him much more forcefully than she had before. He stepped back, trying to steady himself quickly, but she followed up with an even harder push and didn't let up until he hit the bed frame and fell back onto it.

It was an odd position to be in for Daryl Dixon. Laying back on a bed with a girl overtop of him. His feelings were … complicated, to say the least, when he felt the girl's hands on his chest, pressing him down, until he realized they were still shaking. "Hey, you did good," he said, grabbing one of her wrists gently, wanting to help steady her, but she pulled sharply out of his grasp and staggered back toward the door.

"Fuck you," was all she said before she was gone, leaving him still lying on the bed staring after her.

* * *

A/N: Thanks for the review moonandstars1989! Hopefully you continue to enjoy it. :)


	5. El Chapo

"What's wrong, Nebraska?"

She'd been uncharacteristically quiet as they worked side by side in the REC Room, she folding laundry while he worked on cleaning the guns before they made any attempts at coaching the rest of the group on how to use them. "Nothing," she said shortly, as monosyllabic as she'd been for the entire day.

He scratched the back of his neck as he looked her over, searching for any clues. She didn't have any fresh bruises, she wasn't favoring one arm over the other, and as far as he knew, Ed was still largely incapacitated. She could've been mad at him, he supposed, but she hadn't been the last time he'd seen her. "Lemme ask you something," he began. "The first time we met, you had a backpack full of-"

"That wasn't the first time we met," she interrupted him, her eyes firmly focused on the t-shirt she had folded and then refolded at least three times that he'd noticed, trying to make it perfect.

"The time we met on the fire escape," he amended, waiting for a moment to be certain she wasn't going to protest further. "A backpack full of stolen prescription drugs. Why?" It was something that had always felt out of character for the girl he was still getting to know.

"To sell," she answered simply.

Shane sat the gun he was working on down on the table between them, giving his full attention to the girl who still seemed to be avoiding him. "So you're a drug dealer now, huh?"

"Guess so." That was all he got. No jokes about calling her Pablo Escobar. No winks or mischievous smiles. Just more folding.

Having had enough, he reached across the table and ripped the shirt out of her hand, finally forcing her to look up at him. "What the hell is wrong with you?" He expected another sullen 'nothing', but instead she shrugged, wringing her hands together now that she had nothing to work on. His irritation quickly slid into concern. "Talk to me, kid."

"I don't-" she cut herself off, looking hesitant. "I don't think I can do it."

Lincoln didn't give him much of a hint for what she was talking about, her eyes now firmly fixated on her shoe laces. He looked around them for a clue, his eyes landing on the guns. "Shoot them?" he guessed. She glanced up at him briefly before looking back down. "You think they're still people." It was a statement, not a question.

"I don't want to hurt anyone."

"You gonna let one of those things take a bite out of Sophia because you don't want to hurt 'em?" She shrugged her shoulders, still looking down at her feet. "Look at me," he ordered, and she obliged. "You think it's wrong how I protect myself? How I protect you? Was it wrong when I shot those walkers that were trying to eat our people?"

"No-"

"Then why is it wrong for you?" She opened her mouth, ready to respond, before realizing she didn't have an answer for him. "Protecting yourself, protecting the people you care about … that doesn't make you your father, Lincoln."

He knew he hit the nail on the head when she looked up at him now, her eyes wide and mouth falling open slightly, before she quickly clamped it shut. She gave him a vague shrug-nod combination of acknowledgment before grabbing a new shirt off her pile of laundry.

Several painfully long moments of silence passed between them as each carried on with their respective work. "So," Shane began, less comfortable with the silence than Lincoln seemed to be. "El Chapo." Finally a smile. "A 22 year old drug dealer that still lives at home with mom and dad … you must've been a pretty shit at dealing or real bad at money management. Which one was it?"

"Bit of both," she admitted. "If I knew the world'd go to shit a month after I graduated, I would've spent it on something cooler than college."

"What'd you go for?"

Something about the question felt nostalgic to Lincoln. Like she'd been transported back to her freshman year where the first thing you asked anyone was what their major was. "Early Childhood Education."

Lincoln rolled her eyes as Shane's eyebrows shot up. "A drug dealing kindergarten teacher," he commented. "Why?"

The question came as a surprise to him. He'd never shown that kind of interest in a woman's career choices before. He'd never cared about why they did what they did, but there was something inherently interesting in imagining the girl in a cardigan and pencil skirt standing in front of a group of five year olds.

"Sometimes school is the only place kids feel safe," she answered simply, with more open honesty than he'd grown to expect from her. "Teachers are important."

"They are," he agreed, glancing over his shoulder as he heard the door open. He let out a loud sigh when he saw it was Carol and Sophia, Carl and Lori not far behind. Carol hesitated when she stepped inside the room, looking at Shane like he was more dangerous than any of the walkers he'd been protecting her from over the past month. "Carol," he greeted, hoping the greeting didn't sound as forced as it felt.

Lincoln watched as her mother ignored the greeting, looking back towards Lori. "Maybe we should let them play in your room …"

"There's plenty of room in here," Lincoln said loudly before her mother could dart back out the way she'd come. "Plenty more things for them to play with, too."

Carol looked like the last thing she wanted was to spend a prolonged period of time in the same room as Shane Walsh, but Sophia was already inside, running to grab a board game to play with her sister. Lincoln smiled, finishing the last of the clothes quickly as Sophia and Carl hurried to set up Candyland on the table between them.

The simplicity of the time with her family only lasted a handful of minutes before Glenn came running into the Rec Room, telling Shane to come with them and for the rest of them to pack up all of their stuff because they had to leave. The group dissolved into chaos, her mother crying because she didn't want to leave, because they'd finally found somewhere safe and they couldn't just get rid of it, while Lori tried to force her to listen, to keep a steady head just in case, though she assured her her husband would figure out what was best for them.

Lincoln didn't hesitate in collecting her things. She could see the panic on Glenn's face, she could hear it in his voice. He was afraid and she didn't want to stick around what had made him so frightened for very long. She crammed her clean clothes and the handful of new ones she'd received at the CDC into her bag, along with a few books she'd taken from the library, deciding Jenner would understand, before following the sounds of shouting against her better judgment.

She winced as she arrived in the main computer room in time to see Shane and Rick struggling to subdue an axe wielding Daryl. She wasn't close enough to hear what they were discussing, but she could see the tears in everyone's eyes and she realized the doors that let them out were sealed shut, leaving them trapped. At least they were for a moment before Jenner finally seemed to agree to release them.

She followed the group as they all ran and she caught sight of the sunlight and outdoors for the first time since they'd arrived, but they still weren't out. Daryl took his axe to the glass windows first but couldn't make a dent before T-Dog tried with a chair, and then Shane tried to shoot at it but still the glass wouldn't break. "Rick, I have something that might help," she heard her mother call out, rustling through her backpack.

"Carol, i don't think a nail file is gonna help right now," said Shane, running his hands through his hair in a way that she had quickly learned meant he was very, very frustrated. But it wasn't a nail file her mother pulled out, and instead a hand grenade. "Get down, get down," Shane quickly ordered, waving everyone backwards as Rick made quick use of the grenade, taking a window out that would let them leave.

They ran and ran and ran, barely making it to the RV in time before the CDC exploded behind them, rocking the RV so hard they all feared it might actually topple over. But it didn't and after a quick moment to collect themselves and realize how close they'd come to death, they drove off, leaving the smoky remnants of the first safe haven they'd found behind them.

* * *

Words could not describe how much she hated being stuck in the RV. Stuck wasn't a severe enough word. Trapped, perhaps. Trapped like a caged bird. As if being stuck inside the vehicle wasn't punishment enough, she was also trapped with the worst of the worst of their still surviving group.

Daryl had taken his motorcycle, Shane his jeep, and Rick had gone with Lori, Carl, Carol, and Sophia in a Daryl's truck. There hadn't been enough space for her, and there hadn't been enough space for her father, who, a week after the incident, seemed to be recovering more quickly than she would have liked. Glenn and Dale sat in the front of the RV leaving her only with a crying Andrea and a silent T-Dog.

The silence gave her time to think, though she couldn't be certain if that was a blessing or a curse. Each half eaten corpse they passed along the highway forced her to mull over the last conversation she'd had with Shane. He'd insisted it wasn't wrong to protect herself or those she cared about, but it felt wrong deep down in her gut. Flashes of walkers grabbing Sophia kept coming into her mind and each time she froze, unable to do what she had to do to save her sister. Even in her own daydreams she couldn't be strong.

"Uh oh," she heard Dale muttered from the driver's seat, causing everyone in the RV to sit up a bit straighter to see what the problem was.

A blockade. An unintentional one, perhaps, but an effective one nonetheless. Nearly a hundred abandoned vehicles littered the highway and even Daryl in his motorcycle couldn't find a way for the larger vehicles to navigate a way through. They'd have to turn around, circle back a different way, but first they'd have to siphon more gas.

The fresh air felt like heaven as she stepped down into the sunlight in the middle of Lori's lecture. "This place is a graveyard," she told the group sternly, sounding like she was more than only Carl's mother. "We need to be respectful."

There were a few grunts of acknowledgment as the group dispersed, all of them eager to spread their wings after being cooped up for so long, and Lincoln was quick to follow. "Where do you think you're goin'?"

She hesitated in her next step, looking over her shoulder to where her father was leaning back against the RV, lighting a cigarette. She opened her mouth, willing a quick excuse to come to her tongue, but Daryl Dixon beat her to it. "She's with me," he grunted, jerking his chin toward the mass of cars to indicate for her to follow him.

Lincoln waited for just a moment longer, wondering if her father would protest but deep down knowing he wouldn't. The Dixon brothers had always made the rest of the group fairly uncomfortable, and even with Merle gone, Daryl was still not a man to be trifled with and most around the camp knew to pick their battles with him. Lincoln hadn't spoken to him since that night back at the CDC and didn't particularly wanted to go anywhere with him, but he was at least one step up from her father and she was quick to jog after him. "You didn't have to do that," she called after him, though she wasn't sure why. Maybe she didn't want to feel like she owed him something.

Daryl stopped so suddenly she nearly jumped as he jutted his chin out again, this time back toward her father, who was still watching them. "He's right there if you want to go back to him," said Daryl. She didn't move. "Yeah, I didn't think so."

Sheer belligerence made her contemplate turning back around to rejoin her father just to prove him wrong, but common sense won out as she resumed following after him. He swerved around the vehicles with the confidence of a man who knew there weren't any walkers lurking around the corner. While the rest of the group tiptoed around each vehicle to check the other side, Daryl stomped boldly. "You're not afraid," she observed.

"Of _Ed_?" he demanded, saying her father's name was such bewilderment she almost laughed. "Ain't nobody afraid of Ed but you." Lincoln opened her mouth to tell him that wasn't what she'd meant, but he wasn't finished talking. "Don't know why, either. He ain't gonna do shit with Roid Rage walkin' around."

An involuntary smile tugged at the corner of her lips at Shane's nickname. She remembered that Shane had been the one to tackle him back at the CDC and he'd also been the one to put him in the headlock back at camp when he found out Merle had been left behind. "Probably not," she agreed.

"Not gonna tell me to go fuck myself this time?" he wondered, sticking a hose down into the gas tank of a truck to try to siphon gas from it.

"I don't think that's what I said last time, either," she said, her smile growing.

Daryl turned his attention to her and Lincoln fully expected an argument, but Daryl only looked at her for a second before his attention shifted past her. She barely had time to turn her head to try to see what he was looking at before he grabbed and shoved her to the ground. She hit the pavement hard, wincing as her elbow hit painfully, but he didn't give her time to complain before he was on the ground with her, forcing her under the truck before following.

Lincoln knew better than to question what he was doing. She didn't know what was going on, but her heart was slamming against her ribcage as she waited quietly for what felt like an eternity before she heard the groans. Dozens, if not hundreds, of feet started dragging past them and she grabbed onto Daryl's arm like a vice, digging tiny little holes into his skin with her fingernails. She expected him to jerk out of her grip or smack her hand away, but he returned the gesture, wrapping a large, warm hand around her wrist with just enough pressure to be reassuring.

What was likely only a handful of minutes felt like years beneath the truck, but she stayed quietly and patiently until the worst sound she'd ever heard shot across the highway.

"SOPHIA!"

* * *

A/N: Yes, I know I rushed the scene leaving the CDC. Yes, I know my details for some of these scenes from the show are not perfectly accurate. I hate rewriting exact scenes from the show and sometimes it's unavoidable.

Thanks for the review Atila Dawn Black! I think you got a few of your questions answered in this chapter, actually. While I think Shane probably made the best villain of the show, I think the decision to make him the villain over Lori was a dumb one. Seeing as how he won't be in love with Lori in this story, he will be going down a very different path in this story. Hopefully you enjoy it. :)

And thank you Panpriestess and Luna Latanya for your reviews, as well!


	6. Darlena

The days that followed were some of the most anxiety ridden Lincoln had ever experienced. Sophia was gone, missing, and they hadn't been able to find her. Carl had been shot and Shane had only barely made it back alive with the equipment necessary to keep him alive. They were off the highway, away from any potential future hordes, on a quiet, open farm that felt safe, but her sister was still gone. Carol did everything for Sophia and Lincoln knew damn well the girl wouldn't survive on her own for much longer.

She glanced toward the house as Shane limped down from the stairs, wearing an oversized flannel and a pair of jean overalls she knew damn well didn't belong to him. "Old MacDonald had a farm …" she trailed off, earning herself an annoyed glance.

"Come on," he grunted at her, "we're looking at a map."

"For Sophia?" she asked, quickly getting to her feet and catching up with him as he approached a dark green pickup truck that a handful of the group were currently surrounding.

"Yes," said Rick, glancing over his shoulder to see the pair approaching. He offered her a smile she couldn't quite return upon seeing how pale he was and how dark the circles under his eyes were. He was still so weak from giving blood for Carl and was in no fit state to search for Sophia and neither was Shane. "Now that we've got a base and a map, we'll be able to do a proper search."

"You won't," said Hershel. "Not today, not with as much blood as you've given. And Shane if you don't stay off that ankle now you'll be off it for a month."

A heavy silence fell over the group as they let the information sink in. With Rick and Shane out of commission, they were running out of options for people who could look for the girl. Glenn couldn't go out on his own, Ed certainly had no intentions of searching through the woods for his daughter, and that really only left … "Guess it's just me, then," said Daryl.

"Are you gonna be okay on your own?" asked Rick.

"I'm better on my own," Daryl assured them, hooking his bow over his shoulder and turning from the group without any further discussion. Lincoln watched him go longingly. She was going to go insane if she continued to sit at camp doing nothing waiting for someone else to find her sister. At least if she was out there looking for her, she would know she was doing something to help. She felt her feet start to follow after Daryl, almost as if of their own volition, before an arm around her bicep stopped her.

"Just where the hell do you think you're going?" demanded Shane.

Shane didn't have a sibling. He didn't have a younger sister he'd spent his whole life trying to protect. He didn't and wouldn't understand the overwhelming guilt in the pit of her stomach that would not go away until Sophia was found. "I want to help him look for Sophia," she explained.

He ran an exhausted hand over his newly cropped head. "I'll go with him," he offered instead. Extending the pain in his ankle was the preferable option to sending Lincoln out into the walker infested wilderness in a hapless search for her sister that should've been called off after the first 24 hours.

"I'll be fine," she assured him with a gentle smile, slipping out of his grasp and edging backwards toward the stables Daryl had just disappeared into. "It's Daryl's natural habitat. What could possibly stop him when he's in his prime hillbilly state?"

Shane wasn't anywhere near convinced but Rick put a hand on his shoulder to urge him to let her go as she quickly turned on her heel and chased after Daryl. "It's her sister," said Rick. "You can't expect her to sit around and wait for someone else to find her."

"If only the rest of her family was so inclined to help," grumbled Shane, glancing toward the RV where Ed was currently smoking, leaning back against the RV and looking without a care in the world.

Lincoln finally made it into the stables as Daryl was finishing saddling a horse. "No," he said, after taking one quick look at her. He was smart enough to know what she was there for and smart enough to know she would be more of a hindrance than anything while he was searching.

"Sophia was terrified of you," she reasoned. "If she sees you, she's gonna run in the other direction." Daryl had considered that possibility, having had very minimal interaction with the missing girl, but he liked to assume her self preservation skills were strong enough to prefer him over continued isolation in zombie infested woods. "The first person she sees should be someone she knows."

"You even know how to ride a horse?"

"Of course," she said quickly. "Who doesn't know how to do that?"

Daryl clicked his tongue at her as he gestured her over, closer to the horse. "You're a terrible liar," he informed her, watching as she struggled to pull herself onto the horse but offering no assistance until it came time to pull himself up behind her. He could feel her entire body go tense at his sudden proximity and hesitated, wondering if she would change her mind and decide to stay at the farm.

She didn't. "Or am I just lying poorly so you let your guard down for when I really need to lie about something?"

His brow furrowed as he mulled the idea over, but couldn't come to a conclusion as he led the horse further and further away from the farm. It was almost peaceful out in the woods, with the sun shining through the leaves and little but the horse's hooves and birds chirping making any sound around them. Normally silence suited him just fine, but it was making him uncomfortable in his present circumstances. "She ever a Girl Scout or anything?"

"No," said Lincoln. "This was her first time out of Atlanta. She's never been camping or alone or-"

He could hear the strain in her voice and knew it was the reason she'd gone quiet. She didn't want him to hear the sudden emotion and sign of weakness. He knew he ought to say something comforting but nothing was coming to mind. A twelve year old girl with zero outdoors experience left alone in the woods for three days was likely dead, even before you added the monsters trying to eat her into the mix. "Never know," was all he mustered, and the pair fell into another painful silence.

He was grateful for the quiet when it allowed him to quite clearly hear the unmistakable sound of rattlesnake and became very alert, trying to keep the horse calm as it began to whinny and pull against him.

"Shh, shhh," Daryl soothed, reaching around Lincoln and stroking the beast's neck. Lincoln contemplated sliding off the horse quickly; it would be better than getting bucked off if the horse didn't calm down. But before she got the opportunity, she spotted the snake, and so did the horse. It jumped up to almost full height, bucking both she and Daryl off.

Lincoln landed solidly on the ground beneath the horse's feet and frantically rolled to the side to avoid being stomped on. She had almost rolled herself to safety when she felt her whole body jerk closer and closer to the edge of the mountain, against her will. It was only then she realized her leg was caught in Daryl's bow, and he had already gone over the edge.

She tried to grab it, to free herself in time, but she was too late as she plummeted down the side of the mountain, hitting every rock and every tree that was in her path until she finally hit the riverbed below. She cried out in pain as she felt a sharp, piercing pain in her side the moment she hit the ground, but quickly covered her mouth. She couldn't alert any nearby walkers. She struggled to sit up, her brain woozy and blood leaking out from her head, legs, and arms, but mostly from her abdomen, where one of Daryl's arrows had lodged itself.

"Daryl," she cried, trying to look around for where he had landed as she clutched at her side. He had landed a few feet away from her, but looked to be unconscious. Slowly, painfully, she dragged herself toward him and began to shake him awake. "Come on," she urged under her breath, gasping at the pain her side as she struck him across the face. He stirred but still his eyes stayed close. She held back her cries, but couldn't stop herself from leaning over, and pressing her head against his, "Please, Daryl," she said through her teeth, trying not to cry.

"The f …" he mumbled. "Happen …" She pulled away quickly, which wasn't a great idea as a surge of pain went through her entire body. "What was that?"

"We fell," she said, biting her lip as he sat up, rubbing his head and staring at the blood it left on his palm. "Are you …"

"I'm fine," he lied convincingly enough, deciding it wouldn't be a great motivator to let her know he was currently seeing three of her whenever the world stopped spinning long enough for him to focus. "Son of a bitch," he muttered when his vision finally cleared enough to see how far they'd fallen. "Can you stand?"

Lincoln didn't answer as she watched him struggle to his feet, knowing she wouldn't be able to do the same. He finally took a good look at her and felt his stomach churn. Her shirt had been white when they'd left the farm, but it was now a deep shade of red, wet and clinging to her skin. It didn't take long for him to spot the source - one of his own arrows. His stomach churned again, this time with guilt. He tore at the sleeves of his flannel, grateful he still had the strength to do so, before approaching her. "What are you-ah!" she gasped, throwing a blood covered hand over her mouth to contain her cry as he tied his sleeves around her to stabilize the arrow.

"Hopefully that'll keep it from moving until we get back to the farm," he said.

"How?" she barely managed to demand. If she had thought the arrow in her side hurt before, it was ten times worse now. She didn't want to question Daryl's knowledge of helping wounds, but his method seemed to be having an adverse effect. "We can't … I can't climb back up that …"

Daryl glanced up at the side of the mountain; it was almost completely vertical, with nothing but tiny trees and the occasional rock to propel himself up with. "Doesn't look so bad," he lied, shrugging. "Think you can hold on to me?"

Lincoln's eyes widened as she looked from him to the mountain and back. "You can't be serious!" she exclaimed. "Daryl, not even you …"

"Come on, I ain't got all day," he snapped, crouching down in front of her. Hesitantly, she wrapped her arms around his chest and felt an odd sensation as he lifted her up and off of the ground. Immediately, her legs wrapped around him, as well, even though it hurt to do so.

"Are you … sure you can do this?" she asked nervously as he approached the side of the mountain and tugged on some roots to see if they would hold.

"I'd hold on tight," he advised, hoisting them both into the air with his first movement. "It's gonna be a long fall if you let go."

Daryl pulled himself up, but it seemed like every movement he made was causing her more and more pain. The tighter she gripped, the more she would whimper, and it got to the point where the dampness on the back of his neck was more than just sweat.

"You crying?" he grunted, heaving himself up.

"No," she lied. He slipped a bit, missing the branch, and jerking to the left. She let out a cry, against her will, that echoed out.

"God damn it," Daryl muttered, regaining his foothold and heaving himself up. "Will you shut the hell up?" She didn't answer him and it made him nervous. She had lost a lot of blood and the silence paired with a rapidly loosening grip … "No," he said, scrambling to reach around to hold her up, knowing it would be impossible to keep climbing … but he couldn't just let her drop. "No. No, no no no ... " her hands began to slip, losing her grip completely, her legs dangled and Daryl had no choice but to let go of the side of the cliff and hold on to her instead as they fell back towards the creek.

They hit the ground with a painful thud, more painful than their first fall by far. Daryl was out like a light instantly, the world going black as his head smashed into a rock. He had no idea how much time passed before he felt something kicking at his ribs. "Leave me be," he grumbled at the girl. He had earned himself a little nap, carrying her stupid ass halfway up the side of a mountain.

"Get your ass up, Darlena," came the response. Daryl's eyes flew open; Merle? His heart caught in his chest as he saw his brother standing above him, his head blocking out the shining sun. "There ain't no rest for the wicked, baby brother."

Daryl's eyes faded close against his will, and he had to force them to open back up. "I had a shitty day, bro," he mumbled.

Merle didn't look sympathetic as he crouched down beside his brother. "That so? You want me to get you a pillow? Maybe a beer and a pretty girl?"

"Fuck off," Daryl replied, coughing and spluttering blood down his chin.

Merle grimaced and leaned back and away from Daryl, his eyes drifting toward where Lincoln lay, still unconscious and losing blood fast. "Looks like you already got yourself one of those, don't it?" the eldest Dixon teased, chuckling as he walked over and circled Lincoln instead. "Didn't I teach you nothing, little brother? It's not your arrows you wanna stab 'em with."

"It was … accident …"

Daryl blinked and Merle was above him again, though there hadn't been time for him to travel from Lincoln's side to his own. "Why don't you take it out, dummy?" he demanded. "You'll be able to close the wound better."

Daryl grimaced as she sat up, his head quickly spinning, "Better hurry, son, don't look like she's got much fight left in her," Merle teased, crouching over Lincoln again and reaching for the arrow.

"Don't!" Daryl shouted, crawling over to her and waving him away. He was standing again though and watching as Daryl ripped away the bottom hem of her shirt to inspect the wound, he rolled her to her side and winced as he gripped the feathered end of it and pulled gently, blood seeped out in thick streams as he did so.

"Don't nurse it, boy, you gotta make it clean!" Merle instructed.

"Shut up! I got this!" Daryl snapped and Merle merely chuckled from behind him. Daryl finally managed to get a good grip and pulled it out at quickly, but smoothly as he could. He used the ripped part of her shirt and that of his ripped sleeves to tie around her waist, in an attempt to stop the heavy flow of blood. She already looked paler than usual. "Shit," he muttered. "Shit, shit shit …"

He looked around desperately for Merle; his brother's constant teasing seemed to disappear now that Daryl really needed his help. "You never were around," he grumbled to himself as he dropped down beside the girl again and wrapped his sleeve around her slender waist, tying it impossibly tight. It might hurt her, but it would definitely slow the bleeding. "If you're gonna wake up, it needs to be now," he told the girl, shaking her one last time before conceding that she was probably going to be out for the long haul.

He stood, deciding he needed to establish his own ability to walk before carrying anyone else around. He paced around her body for a short moment before his eyes spotted something in the riverbed only a few yards away: a doll. He all but lunged for it, nearly losing his footing before reaching it. He hadn't paid much attention to Sophia but he still recognized the doll, he still knew it had been hers.

Feeling energized with a renewed purpose, he turned back to Lincoln. He glared from her unconscious body to the wall and back again, before nodding his head. Merle would be able to do it, he had no doubt about that. He could probably hike up a mountain with two girls thrown over his shoulders and he wouldn't even break a sweat.

If Merle could do it, so could he. He hooked his hands under the girl's arms and picked her up, quickly moving one hand under her rump and keeping the other one free as he approached the side of the cliff. It would have been easier to use both hands to carry her, but he had to practice keeping one hand free for climbing.

"Don't you fucking fall on me again," he warned her unconscious body as he grabbed the roots of a tree and began his climb. He had made it halfway again, in a matter of minutes, right to the same spot he had fallen before. It was too far to reach to get to the next tree he had to grab - and that had been with two hands. There was no way he was reaching it with one.

Daryl glanced toward the top of the cliff - he still had an absurd way to go and his arm was already burning. It wouldn't hurt if he just … rested, only for a moment. Holding his place with his free arm and finding stable ground with his feet, he pressed himself against the girl and her against the terrain, resting his face in the crook of her neck. "Kick off them heels and climb, son!" Merle shouted again. "Now ain't the time for bumping uglies."

"I don't see you trying to help me," Daryl shouted at his brother, jerking so suddenly and angrily that he nearly lost his footing again.

"You need help?" Merle asked from where he was sitting at the top of the hill. "Why don't you call for your pal Rick's help?"

"He ain't my pal," Daryl said through his teeth. He adjusted her, heaving her up over his shoulder. "Come on," he encouraged. He felt as if she was balanced well, and his head wasn't spinning long enough for him to eye the next branch he would go for.

"If you drop her, this would be a whole lot easier," Merle reminded him. Daryl all but growled as he threw his body up to the next branch, his fingers barely reaching around it and maintaining a grip. He felt her slip, so he hastily eased himself up and wrapped his arm around her, pressing her against the hillside again.

"Don't fall," he breathed against her. "I didn't make it all this way so you could fucking fall." He continued to climb, sweating profusely, but never losing his grip again.

"Girl owes ya for this," said Merle, watching with muted interest as his baby brother grew closer and closer to the mountain top. "Maybe she'll even touch yer pecker …"

"Shut up," Daryl grunted as Merle cackled above him.

"Come on, son, reach out and grab your pal Rick's hand," Merle teased as Daryl almost reached the top. Daryl glared at his brother's extended hand. It's not real, he thought. He's not really there.

Ignoring the hand, Daryl continued to climb. The last stretch was the hardest, but finally, finally he grasped the top of the mountain. His hands were bleeding something terrible as he heaved himself and Lincoln up to the top, but he had made it. They had made it. He rolled himself off of her and stared down at her. She was still out, still bleeding profusely, still growing paler by the moment.

Without a moment's hesitation, he got to his feet and grabbed her again, hoisting her up with both hands this time. Now he only had to hope he didn't run into any walkers on his long trip back to the farm.

* * *

A/N: Hey, who knew Daryl was (apparently) a love interest in this? I sure didn't remember. I actually lowkey hate Daryl in the show now, but my friend I wrote this with definitely loved him and I actually did enjoy him for the first two seasons when he actually had a personality. For anyone who's here for Shane (as you all should be as he is the better man), this is definitely primarily a Shane fic, so don't worry.

Noooowww special thanks:

 **Panpriestess** & **PlaidPajamas01** : I'm glad you're both enjoying and hope you continue to do so! I definitely appreciate the reviews as they inspire me to want to actually edit and post.

 **Atilia Dawn Black:** Lori was totally the villain! Imagine how OP and awesome the group would be if Rick and Shane had stayed best buds and led them together! Also, I'm glad you're on board with Link becoming more competent! It's definitely going to be a process but the goal is for sure to make her a stronger character. Gotta have that arc and character development and all that. :P Thanks for your review!

 **Crystaltonics:** I'm glad you also suffer from wanting to read about characters no one ever seems to write about. There are ten billions Daryl/OC fics but where are my Shane stories?! This is also how I feel when I want to read Tony Stark/OC stories and you're always his daughter instead. -_- Thanks for the review and I hope you continue to enjoy!


	7. That Girl

He'd been locked inside the room with her for days. Longer than she'd have let him stay if she was conscious enough to tell him so. The search for Sophia had come to a screeching halt after Daryl returned to camp with her, both closer to death than he ever wanted to see her again. He'd have liked to push Daryl the rest of the way, but that was why he was condemned to her room and not allowed to venture anywhere near where that dumbass hick was recovering. He still wasn't entirely sure what had happened out in the forest, but he knew only Daryl Dixon was stupid enough to take the horse Hershel called Nervous Nelly.

But there was an upside ot Daryl's colossal failure and that was the end of the foolish expenditure of resources that was searching for Sophia Peletier. He knew the moment Rick lost her that she was gone. There was a reason missing person cases were so hard. After 48 hours, you were looking for a corpse, and that was back before the world had turned to shit. Sophia had been gone for a week. She was dead and he knew it. Rick knew it. Deep down he was sure Daryl knew it, too. He was tired of people getting hurt looking for whatever was left of her.

Of course, it was much easier to think these things in his head than to tell Lincoln that. If it had been anyone else's little girl, he'd have put his foot down much more firmly. But Lincoln made things a bit more … difficult. It was much easier to refuse to look for Sophia while she was unconscious.

A sharp, painful gasp for air dragged him from his thoughts. She was awake now, but too suddenly, and she was terrified, unsure of her surroundings in a room she'd never ventured to before. "Hey, hey," he said, placing a hand reassuringly against her cheek and one atop her belly to keep her from moving too much and reopening the wound Daryl's arrow had left. Wide, frantic eyes relaxed upon seeing it was him with her. "You're alright, you're safe."

"Sophia?" she asked, before breaking into a fit of coughs that threatened to undo her stitches.

"Yeah, she's good," he lied, unsure of why he had the moment it left his lips. He needed her to calm down, to relax and not undo all of the healing several days in bed had afforded her, but she would remember this. The best he could hope was for her to think the lie a dream when she awoke again to find Sophia not safe and sound at the farm."You don't have to worry about her anymore."

It was hard to watch the relief splash across her face. Now reassured, she let her eyes travel around her surroundings. Floral wallpaper on the walls, dark, hardwood floors, a large, fluffy bed with a big, white comforter. The bedroom felt untouched by what she knew had happened in the world and part of her wondered if everything that had happened in the past few weeks had been her dreaming. She settled back into the bed, finally enjoying the comfort the pillow and mattress gave her aching body. Parts of their fall were coming back in bits and pieces, but she hadn't forgotten the arrow that had gone through her for a moment. "What about Daryl?"

"He'll live," said Shane, sounding like he wished he wouldn't. Lincoln gave him a knowing smile as her eyes grew heavy. Her father hadn't laid a hand on her in weeks, he'd made sure of that, but even so, she still found a way to get injured. She'd damn near split her head open on a rock, there were bruises and cuts across every inch of her, and she'd barely missed hitting an organ with that arrow. "You're a very stressful person to care about, you know that?"

"May've heard that before," she said lazily, rolling her head so her cheek pressed more firmly into his hand. Any complaint he may have had about her evaporated in an instant. "Tough job but somebody's gotta do it kinda situation, right?"

"Right," he confirmed, wondering to himself when he'd gone so soft. He could only imagine what a field day Rick would be having if he could see his old partner sitting at the girl's bedside, running his fingers through her hair until she drifted back off to sleep.

* * *

The last thing Shane wanted to see was Lori Grimes waiting for him when he left Lincoln's room. He barely spared her a glance as he brushed past her, hoping to reach the stairs before she could get out whatever bullshit she planned on saying to him. "So she's awake," the woman observed, just as his foot hovered above the first step. _Fuck_. He hesitated where he stood and looked up to meet her eye. "I could hear you talking. Figured it wasn't to yourself."

He bit back a comment about her lurking outside Lincoln's room trying to listen in on whatever he had to say to the girl. "She was," he admitted. "She ain't now."

Shane hoped that would be the end of the conversation, but Lori seemed to be in it for the long haul. "Did you tell her we still haven't found Sophia?" Even from a distance, Lori could see his jaw bone working. He'd always been terrible at hiding his emotions. You could see it in his eyes most of the time, but his anger always came in at his jaw. "That's a no."

"You want her to know so bad, go on in and tell her," he suggested.

"How long do you think you can keep playing hero with that girl?"

That was a loaded question, he thought. A thousand answers came rushing to the tip of his tongue, each meaner than the one that came before it. He wasn't playing at hero. He'd saved her, he'd saved Carl, at least half a dozen times since he took them out of Atlanta. He'd done what he could to keep everyone at camp safe, especially Lincoln. "You know her name," was what he finally decided to say.

"What?"

"You know her name," he repeated. "Ain't never heard you say it, though." How many times had he heard her call her _that girl_? "Why don't you find some other way to occupy your time than worrying about me? I hear there's always laundry to be done."

The look that crossed her face told him his insult had its desired effect. "Your time would be better spent searching for Sophia instead of trying to sleep her with sister."

Shane opened his mouth to respond, abandoning his position by the stairs and desire to escape as he stormed over to her. He wasn't sure what he intended to say to her, and he never found out what it may have been as Andrea came up the stairs. "Hey, Shane," she called, either oblivious to the tension she'd just walked in on or choosing to ignore it. "Whatever happened to us having shooting practice?"

"You shot Daryl in the head from a hundred yards away, I think you'll be alright," he replied, more hostile than he probably ought to have been as he pushed past her to go downstairs and left her and Lori to talk about what an asshole he was in peace.

Downstairs wasn't a more pleasant environment for him. Daryl was on his feet, bandages wrapped around his head and a crutch under one of his arms as he hobbled around the kitchen, Carol following behind and fretting over him. Shane's first urge was to go over and punch him in the head right where the little patch of blood was showing through, but he knew he shouldn't. He'd told Lincoln the man was fine and he wanted to be right about at least one of them.

He was quick to flee the kitchen before either had a chance to speak to him, and he didn't stop going until he reached the woods and the silence he'd been craving to help temper the anger boiling inside him.

* * *

 **A/N:** Boy, oh boy that was a long delay between chapters. Sorry about that! Unfortunately I'm a pretty terrible fanfic writer and I just write what I'm inspired to write. I've honestly completely stopped watching The Walking Dead so it's hard to get inspired to write this without just rewatching Season 1 and 2 on repeat.

But! The good news! I haven't abandoned this! I've updated and I plan to at least try to update a bit more regularly now that's summer and I'm not teaching. If there's anyone still reading this, thanks for sticking with me!

Now, for anyone still here, I have a question! As I've mentioned, a lot of this story was pre-written a while ago. I've added a lot more scenes in and made a lot of edits, but at least half of this was written a long time ago. After the last chapter, everything I'd already written was used up. That's part of the reason why it took me so long to update, but it's also exciting! Now that I'm fully in control of what's happening next, please let me know what you want to see happen. I don't mean story wise, as I already know what I want there, but with romances.

This was, first and foremost, a story written to fill the absolute lack of Shane fanfiction anywhere. That's not going to change. However, I've clearly started _something_ with Daryl. Please let me know what you'd prefer me to do:

Keep her entirely with Shane

Shane AND Daryl

Shane and someone else?

 _Special thanks to:_

 **Atilia Dawn Black:** I totally feel you on not enjoying Daryl anymore! That's why I was pretty surprised to see he was a love interest in this. I enjoyed him much more back when he still had Merle influences on him back in Seasons 1, 2, and a bit of three. Sophia eating Ed WOULD totally be poetic justice … damn, I might have to do a rewrite to include that now. :P Thanks for your review!

 **Nirvana14:** I'm thrilled to hear you enjoy it! I hope you've stuck around long enough to enjoy the new chapter and I promise to not take quite so long to update again. :)

 **AlyssaWrites96:** Wow, that's high praise! I've admittedly never stopped to read any of TWD stories on here because they're all about Daryl instead of Shane, but it's great to hear you think this is good! And since you asked so nicely for me to continue, I have! :P

 **SweetSouthernSass:** There is more to come! :P I hope you continue to enjoy it! Thank you so much for your review. :)

 **Where'sMyPenn:** I will admit yours is the review that made me finally sit down and try to write something down. I can't resist such a nice request for me to continue! I'm glad you're enjoying both Shane and Daryl, so please let me know who you'd like me to continue writing!


	8. Rebirth

He found her sitting on the porch steps shucking a tall pile of corn. The realization that they were well into autumn hit him like a sledgehammer. The Georgian heat was deceptive and he could only hope the others had been paying more attention to the passing days than he had. While it was unlikely they'd face snow or harsh conditions, there'd be no crops growing for the next several months.

He thought she looked much nicer now than he'd ever seen her before. He often found her in a baggy, oversized jacket or sweater, but now she wore a flowered sundress that came above her knee. He thought it likely belonged to one of Hershel's daughters. Shane didn't mind the view in the slightest, but the dress did little to hide the damage. Scars and cuts and bruises covered her legs, some old and some from her recent tumble down a hillside, but they were healing. "Nebraska," he greeted.

"You lied to me," she replied, not looking up from the ear of corn she was undressing.

He hesitated in his next step, his cocky smile fading. "Listen," he began, closing the distance between them and kneeling before her, placing his hands on her legs and forcing her to look down at him. "You were hurt. I know I lied, but I-" Her fingers brushed lightly against his jaw, cutting him short.

"I know," said Lincoln. And she did. She'd been angry when Lori told her Sophia wasn't back at all, but time had provided clarity. She wouldn't have rested so peacefully if she knew her sister was still missing. Part of her was still angry that he sat at camp while only Daryl continued to search for the girl, but she shoved those thoughts down real deep, like she did with most things. "Just wanted to give you a hard time. I don't think enough people do that. Andrea says you've been unbearably moody in my absence."

"That what she said?"

"She says you won't teach her how to shoot even though you said you would," she told him accusingly, her lips pursed as she shifted her attention back to the corn. "You gonna teach me?"

"I'll teach you anything you wanna know," he promised, one hand still gripping her thigh as he used the other to take the corn from her so she'd have to focus on him.

"You gonna teach Andrea?"

The only thing Shane really wanted to teach Andrea at the moment was how to eat a bullet, but he didn't think telling Lincoln that would earn him many points. He was already waiting for the rug to be pulled out from under him. For her to smack his hand away and storm back inside the house. She'd forgiven him too easily. "That's gonna need a bit more persuadin'."

"I can offer you this nice pile of corn," she said with a grin. Shane was unimpressed. "I know my mom already washes your clothes, but I could …" It didn't seem that was the answer, either. "Well, what do you want?"

"You know damn well what I want."

Did she? She thought she'd known back before the farm, before the CDC, when they were still camping outside of Atlanta. He'd rejected her quite soundly then and she wasn't sure her heart was strong enough to survive that a second time. She leaned in closer to him, as slowly as her body would allow, and hesitated a few inches from him. She thought he might close the gap, but he didn't. He stayed right where he was, his attention firmly on her lips as he waited patiently for her to bring them to his.

But then her lips grew smaller as she leaned away, hesitant and unsure, and he followed them as if on a string, closer and closer until he could meet them in what was undoubtedly the most gentle and restrained kiss he'd ever taken part in. He grabbed the edge of the porch behind her so tightly his knuckles were white as he tried to hold himself back from doing anything more. She was skittish like a little rabbit and he didn't think she'd stay around him for long if he let his hand slide up her skirt and do what it wanted to.

Lincoln pulled away shortly after, but he'd expected her to. Anything that happened with her would have to happen at her pace, he knew, and would be a painful lesson in restraint and self control for him. "That's an interesting form of currency," she murmured.

"Just go get her," he grumbled, pushing her up and away from him before he tried to kiss her again. She smiled now, one of the more genuine smiles he'd ever seen on her face, and leaned toward him too quickly for him to process it before she pressed her lips against his cheekbone where a bruise had formed.

And then she was gone, taking her basket of corn with her as she walked back into the house in search of her friend.

* * *

Shane leaned back against the rusted old pickup truck as he watched the group of survivors gather round to go learn how to shoot. Some were useless because they were young. He could forgive that. Lincoln and Hershel's daughters and Carl. They were just kids. It was the grown ass men and women who pissed him off. Women like Carol and Lori and Patricia. Men like Dale and Ed and T-Dog. They'd been alive longer than he had but they didn't know how to take care of themselves. It didn't matter what wisdom he tried to impart on them. They'd all still die.

Rick wasn't quite so dubious of their potential. "You remember this was your idea, right?" he asked, sitting on the hood of the truck.

"I was young then," grumbled Shane. The CDC had been weeks ago; he wouldn't have made the offer now. "I didn't know any better."

"And yet you're still doing it," Rick remarked. His eyes found Lincoln as she struggled over to join the others, relying heavily on Andrea to get her there. She would make a full recovery from her injuries, but she wasn't back at 100% just yet. "She know how you feel yet?"

"She knows," he muttered, sending Rick an annoyed glance.

"And?" He could hear the smile in Rick's voice.

Shane might've made fun of him for acting like a gossipy teenage girl, but Ed Peletier stole his attention. He was walking alongside his wife going to join the rest of the group who were awaiting his instruction. He pushed off of the truck and made his way toward the pair, Rick close behind him. "Where you goin', Ed?" he called loudly, intercepting the pair before they could reach the others.

"You're showing us how to use guns today, aren't you?" It was Carol who asked, her blue eyes wide and watery as she looked up at him. God, he hated Carol. Almost as much as he hated Ed.

"What's that gotta do with you?" Ed's jaw was clenched tightly. He was angry, Shane knew, but the man still wouldn't meet his eye. Ed hadn't looked at him at all since their last encounter. "Why don't you two head back to camp?"

It was the end of the conversation as far as Shane was concerned, but Carol reached out a hand to stop him, her hand resting on his bicep for a short moment before a sharp look from her husband caused her to pull away. "Please," she tried. "If we don't learn how to … those things will kill us."

"What a loss that would be," Shane muttered, shouldering past Ed deliberately as he went to join the others.

"I know you hate Ed," Rick said from behind him, jogging to catch up. "But there are better ways to handle it. They're part of the group and we're only as strong as our weakest member. And Carol-"

"What about Carol?" He stopped and rounded his old partner. "Lemme ask you a question, man. What does Carol do? Wash clothes? Sit in the RV and cry? Maybe we should be asking ourselves why these people are part of the group."

Rick only stared at him, too stunned by his question to formulate a response quickly. "Does Lincoln do more?" he finally asked. "You want to kick her out of the group, too?"

Shane shook his head as he walked away from his friend, rubbing his hand over his head in irritation.

* * *

Andrea was a natural with a gun. She hit every target they put in front of her and even ones they hadn't dreamed she'd be able to hit. Maggie showed potential, and even Carl wasn't terrible. But Lincoln … her hands shook, and no matter how perfectly she'd align her shot, the trembling would send it somewhere else. He didn't know if she was still afraid to use a gun or if it was just a nervous tremor she'd developed over the years, but he knew she'd never be a skilled marksman.

"Come on," he called to her, taking the gun from her hand and leading her back to his vehicle as the others continued to practice. Rick could handle it from there, he was certain.

"That bad, huh?" she asked as she slid into the passenger seat. She instantly felt at ease once she'd closed the door behind her. As shitty as the world had gotten, being in a car still felt safe to her. She leaned her seat back as far as it would go and enjoyed the comfort the seat provided as Shane got in on the driver's side.

"I've seen better shots," he admitted. He glanced at her when she didn't respond to find her head resting against the window as she watched them drive past an empty field. Likely she was enjoying the peace and quiet, he thought. "How you holdin' up?"

"I've been worse," she answered. "I've been better, too." Shane was silent for so long, Lincoln turned away from the window to find him looking frustrated, like he couldn't think of the right way to ask a question he knew he needed to ask. "I know she's gone," she told him. "I'm not stupid." Shane looked at her but didn't speak, waiting for her to go on. "Sophia ain't never had to do shit for herself. She couldn't have survived a night alone and it's been a week. I know she's gone, we don't need to talk about it."

A heavy silence fell over the car and it lasted for several minutes. He wanted to talk to her. It was rare for them to get a moment alone, especially one that offered this level of privacy. No chance of Lori snooping around the corner to listen in or Andrea walking over to swoop Lincoln away. But he didn't think he ought to speak, not about what he wanted to, not after that. So they drove on in silence until they reached a cul-de-sac filled with large McMansions.

"Why are we sleeping on the ground when these places still exist?" his companion asked as they both climbed out of the car.

"When was the last time you slept on the ground?" She'd been in the house in one of the spare bedrooms ever since her fall.

She sent him a grin. "You know what I mean. Why are we here?"

"Time to make you a productive member of the group," he told her, reaching into the trunk of his car to grab the aluminum baseball bat before handing it over to her. "That face only gets you so far."

Lincoln stared down at the bat in her hands. "That why you keep me around?" she wondered. "Hopefully I never have any disfiguring accidents that ruin my contribution to the group." He looked at her expectantly. "What, am I supposed to hit the air?"

"Fair enough," he said, turning on his heel and walking away from the car. She waited for a moment, waiting for him to come back, before chasing after him.

"What are you doing?" she demanded in a harsh whisper, following him into the cul-de-sac where there were a handful of walkers ambling about. Shane ignored her as he approached one of them that looked particularly decomposed. "Shane!" she hissed, her stomach churning as he grabbed the walker by the arm and twisted it around its back before forcing the other arm back, as well. "What the fuck are you doing?"

"You wanted something to hit," he told her, glancing over his shoulder to see two new walkers approaching, having heard the first. "Better do it quick."

She didn't like this one bit. Not one teensy, little bit. She wanted to argue, to ask him to stop, but Shane was someone who got very stuck in his ways. He wouldn't listen and she would only waste time. She clutched the bat in her hand and approached the pair hesitantly, wincing and taking a step back when the walker lunged for her, trying to pull out of Shane's grasp so it could take a chunk out of her. "Come on, Nebraska," he urged. She lifted the bat and swung, barely giving Shane enough time to duck out of the way before her bat smashed into a rotting skull. She put a dent in it, but she didn't hit hard enough to kill it. Without hesitating, she swung again, this time almost knocking its head off its neck, before it crumpled to the ground in front of her. Shane glanced at it, making sure it was as dead as she thought, before he gave her an impressed look. "All right, now go get the other two."

"Go get them?" she repeated. "I don't … can't we just go back with the others? I'll do better with the gun, I promise."

"Go," he insisted, stepping out of her reach when she tried to grab him. He knew he wouldn't be able to stick to his guns if he let her get too close. She gave him a look of betrayal as she stumbled back and away from him, but she listened.

She approached one, her whole body trembling but she wanted to get it over with. She pulled her bat back and swung, hard, the tip of her bat connecting with the side of the walker's head, causing it to fall over, but it was still moving. It rolled over to its stomach and began reaching for her. She let out a quick gasp before swinging her bat down and cracking its skull near in half, the bat was quickly covered with gore. It had stopped moving but she didn't stop swinging, bringing the bat down again and again and again until all that was left of its head was a pile of red mush.

She was panting when she finally finished, her arms throbbing with the sudden exertion, but something in her felt good. It felt right, she thought, and her body felt lighter as if she'd let something out of herself.

Then she heard Shane yell something, and a deep, rattling moaning sound and she look up to see a walker staggering towards her. She let out a yelp, it was just a few feet away but she swung quickly and it only took one hit this time before the walker laid unmoving at her feet. "Jesus," was all she could say.

"You did good, kid," Shane told her, ruffling the curly mop that was her hair. "Let's get you back."

* * *

 **A/N:** Phew! Sorry for the delay. Was there a delay? I'm having trouble keeping track of four stories right now. Hopefully it hasn't been too long since the last time I posted.

Also, I hope I don't make Shane come off like too much of a dick. I mean … he's kind of a dick, but he's got his reasons for it. Shane, in my opinion, was always a pragmatist. He was built for this world, like Dale said. He's not overly sentimental and he's not going to waste time and resources on people that he doesn't care about, especially if they can't help him survive. He cares about Lincoln. He cares about Rick and Carl. He doesn't care about anyone else.

And while this story is primarily about Lincoln, her being here has a huge impact on Shane's motivations. He can't have the same story arc as the show without having the same relationship with Lori, so I have to write a fair amount about him and his thoughts and motivations. Hope you don't mind. :)

 _Special thanks to:_

Aaaahhhhhh I'm not going to do individual responses for this chapter since everyone's just telling me who they want her with. Instead, I'll just give you answers. After taking what the majority of people want into consideration, for now, Lincoln's only interest is going to be Shane. That doesn't mean Daryl isn't interested in her, but god knows what a socially awkward twat he is and he's going to love her from a distance for a while. Things will probably change in the future when we get into season three material, but for now … Shane/Lincoln 5eva :P


	9. Future Plans

**Hershel's Gardening Guide**

 _January-March_

Carrots

Lettuce

Onions

Potatoes

Spinach

Turnips

 _February-April_

Beets

Broccoli

Collards

Kale

 _March-June_

Beans

Corn

Cucumber

Cauliflower

Lincoln grimaced as her pencil left a thick, dark line down the rest of the page when her notebook was pulled from her. "Gardening, huh?" asked Shane, giving her a dubious look before tossing the notebook back to her. "The hell you know about gardening?"

"Nothing," she answered, setting her eraser to work to clean up the page. "That's why I asked Hershel for some tips. He gave me a few packets of seeds, too. Did you know you can grow tomatoes inside year round? They're a pretty good source of vitamin C and vitamin K."

"Sounds important," said Shane, sounding as if he thought the exact opposite.

"Well, it is," said Lincoln. "Without enough vitamin K in your system, your blood won't clot and any cut or scrape you get could kill you. The vitamin C can help your skin tissue regenerate afterwards. But I guess protein would do that, too."

Lincoln chewed on the tip of her thumb thoughtfully before turning back to her notes. "Why you need this stuff, anyway? Hershel's people take care of that."

"They take care of it _now_ , yes."

"They dyin' or somethin'?"

"They will someday," she replied. "Or we'll overstay our welcome and have to leave the farm and then _poof_ … all that knowledge and expertise will be gone. He's spent forty years on this farm learning all there is to know about growing vegetables and tending the farm animals and I'm not supposed to jot some of it down?" Lincoln flipped back in the notebook a few pages. "I've got a few pages on some first aid stuff, too. And a few pages of stuff from Dale, like how to fix a carburetor and … did you know Glenn can hotwire a car?"

Shane's eyebrows shot up before he looked to where Glenn was talking to one of the Greene sisters. "He steal cars?"

"Put down the badge, Officer Walsh, we got bigger fish to fry," Lincoln replied, calling his attention back to her. "You," she pointed to him, though there was no one else around, "need to teach me about guns. Just some basics. Maybe draw me some diagrams for how to clean 'em or if there's a jam."

"I ain't goin' nowhere," he assured her. "Cut the shit. Why you doin' all this?"

"I believe it was you who said it was time for me to become a productive member of the group," she said. "Just so happens I agree." Shane opened his mouth to argue, to tell her he hadn't meant that she wasn't helpful, but she beat him to it. "Don't, I know it's true. I'm not good with a weapon, I can't track like Daryl or hunt, I don't provide food or go on scavenging missions like Glenn. But I'm a quick learner. Speaking of, Maggie says there's a library in town, not more than a mile. I was hoping you might take me."

There were a lot of things worth risking your life for, Shane thought. Food, medicine, weapons … books were not high on his list, but he still found himself sliding into his car with Lincoln in the passenger's seat beside him. "What do you have in there?" he asked, seeing her sifting through her backpack out of the corner of his eye.

Lincoln glanced at him apprehensively before deciding she might as well show him. She needed to rearrange it anyway. "Water," she said, pulling out her water bottle before sitting it in the cup holder. "Food," she had five or six of what appeared to be granola bars. "The seeds Hershel gave me." Shane could only glance at them briefly as he kept his eyes on the road, but he saw at least ten packets. "First aid kid with all the goods. Vicodin. Oxycodone. Some antibiotics and antiseptics. Naproxen, Augmentin, Promethazine, penicillin … you know what, let's just say I have a lot of meds."

"Duly noted," muttered Shane. He didn't want to admit her late night thievery back in the city had proven itself useful.

"Uh … a flashlight, knife, multitool, lighter, some batteries …"

Shane pulled into the parking lot at the library but neither of them got out of his car. "That's a lot of shit," he told her. "That backpack must be pretty heavy." Lincoln shrugged. "There any particular reason you're carrying around pretty much everything you'd need to survive on your own and taking notes on everything your current companions could teach you?"

He watched her shift anxiously in her seat. "I wasn't planning anything," she grumbled, looking like she wanted nothing more than to get out of the vehicle and head into the library. "It's just … something I've thought about."

"Leaving?"

"Sophia's gone. We both know it. She's not coming back. I don't … look, I've probably got a very short life ahead of me and I don't want to spend my few remaining days the way I spent the rest of it. I don't want to be around my parents. I don't want to sleep in a tent on someone else's farm just waiting to die."

Shane was silent for so long Lincoln was beginning to fear the worst, but then he simply opened the car door and stepped out toward the library, gesturing for her to follow. It was locked but a broken window fixed that in no time and in they went. The inside was a bit musty, but it seemed largely untouched by the chaos that had consumed the rest of the world. The apocalypse must've started on a Sunday, she thought, and no one had found much need to raid a library. "What are you looking for?"

"Informative stuff," she answered, heading for the nonfiction section. "You know, Idiot's Guide to Generators. Shit like that."

Shane appeared on the opposite side of the bookshelf, trailing his fingers along the book titles as he searched for anything she might find useful. "So this plan of yours-"

"It wasn't a plan-"

"Were you planning on taking anybody else?"

Lincoln found a book on solar panels and pulled it out, sitting it atop her rapidly growing pile. "You have too many connections," she answered. "What was I gonna do, ask you to leave your best friend? Carl?"

Shane walked over to her pile and added a book on Botany to the top. "Where were you gonna go?"

"Somewhere not half a mile from the highway. Somewhere really in the middle of nowhere. Something by a lake or a river so there'd always be water, maybe some fish. Or maybe a lighthouse. I don't think the walkers are too good at stairs."

Lincoln wandered down to the 'W' section, looking for something on water purification. "And what would you need?"

"More food … water … maybe steal one of Hershel's chickens. There any books on how to raise chickens over there?"

It took three trips for them to take all of the books she wanted out of the library and load them into his backseat. She had snuck a few novels for pleasure reading into the bunch, though she doubted she'd have the time to get around to them. She buckled her seatbelt and leaned back in her seat, reading for the trip back home, but Shane only drove the car a quarter mile further, pulling into a convenience store. "Listen," he began when she gave him a curious look. "You would not last two days on your own." Lincoln sighed and leaned back further into her seat, awaiting the lecture she'd expected. " _We_ would last considerably longer."

"Shane-"

"But if we're gonna go, we need to be more prepared. That means getting more food and water and weapons and anything else we need before we 'll fill the trunk with everything we can and then we'll go."

"You don't have to go."

"I have wanted to leave these people since the CDC," he told her, opening up his door and stepping out of the car. She was quick to follow, taking her bat just in case. The convenience store had been looted and was much more likely to have walkers lurking inside. "Give me a week and we'll go."

Shane held up a hand to keep her back as he ventured into the store first, wincing at the sound of the little bell on the door jingling before taking it as a blessing. He flicked the bell a few times, letting it ring out into the store and felt almost relieved when a walker came charging towards him out of an aisle. He extended his hand toward Lincoln and she placed the hilt of her bat inside it. The tip of the bat made a rather satisfying sound when it connected with its head, but Lincoln seemed less than thrilled when he returned her bat with new chunks of flesh hanging off it. "It's a lot safer on the farm," she called after him as he headed toward the front register and grabbed a basket before tossing the few remaining water bottles that remained inside it.

"Sleeping in a tent in next to the woods is safe?"

"You know what I mean," she grumbled, heading for the feminine hygiene section and tossing every pack of tampons and pads they had and loading up on midol and motrin, as well. "There's people there who can watch your back." She grabbed every bar of soap, bottle of lotion, shampoo, and conditioner and put them in her basket.

"I do just fine watching my own back," Shane assured her, sitting his filled basket by the register and grabbing another. He headed for the aisle of canned goods and grabbed a can of vegetable soup, holding it up to her. "This would feed you and me for a whole day. You know how long it would feed all seventeen of us back at camp?" He dropped the can in his basket and approached her, grabbing a bottle of shampoo out of her own basket. "How long would this last you, two months? Three? How long you think it'd last between you and Andrea and Lori and Carol and Beth and Maggie and-"

"About a week," she guessed. The shampoo never seemed to last very long around camp.

Shane dropped the shampoo back down into her basket in favor of taking her face into his hands instead. "I don't want to take care of them. Not anymore," he said. "I want to take care of you. Will you quit being so damn difficult and let me do that?"

* * *

They cleared out the convenience store and hit three different houses on their way back to farm. Shane's trunk was nearly filled to the brim with supplies they'd need. All they were really missing was a few more bullets, maybe another gun, and considerably more food. "My dad still has a whole box of those MREs he had back in Atlanta," Lincoln said as they rejoined the group at camp. "He pretends he's out so he doesn't have to share them, but he's only eaten a few."

"And I expect if I go over there and ask for them, he'll be more than happy to share?"

Lincoln chewed on her lip, staring over at the tent her parents shared. "I'll take care of it."

"We can find plenty of food," said Shane. "Leave him be." The last thing Shane needed right now was another altercation was Ed Peletier. For the first time in a long time, he really wasn't itching for a fight. He wasn't lying when he told Lincoln how long he'd been waiting to get away. In truth, the only thing that had kept him around so long was her. It felt like a weight had been lifted off him now that there was a light at the end of the tunnel, a future ahead of him that would be difficult but well worth it.

But the tension in Lincoln's shoulders had not alleviated alongside his own. Her jaw was still firmly set as she stared at Ed's tent. "Nah," she said. "I've left him be long enough."

"Lincoln," he warned, catching her by the arm before she could get too far away from him.

"You of all people don't understand why I need to do this?"

Oh, the guilt. What a sucker he was. Shane's hand hovered to the gun at his hip as he watched Lincoln approach the tent. If there was a god, Ed would be on the other side of the house, passed out drunk under one of the willow trees. But of course he wasn't. "The fuck you think you're doin'?" Ed slurred as Lincoln stepped through the flap and into the tent. He had been laying back on a pillow but he sat up sharply at the sight of her and quickly rolled from his ass to his knees to lunge for her when she picked up his box of MREs. "You little bitch!"

Lincoln smiled as she darted out of his way and slipped out of the tent before he could grab her. But Ed was persistent and he came thundering out of the tent in no time, lumbering after her with loud, clumsy steps. She turned around to meet him before he could reach her and eyed the hand he had raised. "You need to rethink what putting a hand on me's gonna get you," she said.

Ed paused in his rage to take in the scene around him. He could see Shane over the top of her head, leaning back against his car with his hand resting on top of his gun. He didn't doubt the man would be more than happy to use it. "Those are mine," he told her through his teeth.

"They were yours," she agreed. "But they're not anymore."

Lincoln waited for him to fuck up. To lose his temper and hit her anyway, but he didn't. Shane's fists had left a hell of a mark on her father and she could only smile at him before turning on her heel to deliver her bounty to Shane. "He's gonna remember that," he warned her, taking the box from her and popping it into his trunk.

"I hope so," she replied, grabbing her backpack out of his backseat and heading towards the woods. Or at least, closer to where Daryl had pitched his tent. Everyone else in the group had chosen to put their tents beside each other, for safety and comfort and whatever other reasons. Daryl Dixon had taken his tent and put it as far away from the group as he could manage while still being able to see them. Lincoln didn't exactly know how to knock on a tent flap, but she lightly tapped on the side of it anyway and let herself in after hearing a grunt of acknowledgment. "How's your head?"

Daryl shrugged, rolling from his side and onto his back to get a better look at her. "The hell was that?" he asked. "You stealin' from your old man now?"

"I'd call it reparations," she answered, dropping onto the floor of the tent beside him and trying to look through his netting down to the main camp. "How do you even see that far? You got binoculars in here or something?"

"20/20," answered Daryl, lightly tapping next to his eye with his middle finger.

Lincoln grabbed him by the chin and tilted his head, clicking her tongue at the sight of the blood still seeping through the bandages wrapped around his head. "You need those changed," she said, jabbing her index finger into his ribcage after he smacked her hand away a bit too hard.

Daryl twisted his body out of her reach, wincing. "Leave me be," he grunted.

"Death by infected boo boo," she muttered. "What a way to go." Resigned to his fate, Daryl watched her as she dug through her backpack until she found the first aid kit. She pulled the scissors out first and set to work on removing his old bandages.

He winced as she scrubbed at his wound with soap and water. "You know, your bedside manner could use some work," he muttered accusatorily. He watched her as she leaned over him, her face close to his as she lifted his head to wrap the bandages around the back of it.

Lincoln glanced down at him with a smile. "You think so?" she asked as she finished wrapping. It looked pretty good for the apocalypse, she thought. She hoped the bandages would stay clean and fresh for at least a few hours, but she knew better than to expect that from Daryl Dixon.

"You're not very comforting." Her mother had done his bandages the night before and she'd been the definition of gentle. Her fingers feather light, her cleaning of his wound as delicate as humanly possible. Lincoln herself had been rather rough and had left him with a pounding headache.

"Now your head's not gonna pop like a zit when that shit gets infected," said Lincoln. "Is that not comforting?"

* * *

 **A/N:** So this is really not the story I needed to be updating right now, but I've been playing this game called Zombie Exodus: Safe Haven and it's totally inspired me. Have any of you played it? You should if you haven't. I think the first bit of the story is free.

Anyway, it lowkey inspired me to actually think about skills and supplies that are important in the apocalypse. Sorry if it's not super exciting to read about Lincoln essentially 'leveling up', but it's something I really enjoy including. Tried to make this chapter a bit longer, too! Hope you enjoy. :)

 _Special thanks to:_

 **Ghouly-Girl:** Aaahhhh I feel like I should've included more mushy moments now! It's so hard to feel like it's appropriate to have them making out when Sophia is missing, but I promise I'll include more after that whole sitch is taken care of. Who knew wanting her to be Carol's daughter would cockblock me in the end? Thanks for the review! :)

 **Nirvana14:** I'm so glad you're still enjoying it! Thank you for your review. :)

 **1MoreInMe1:** Oh jeez thank you! I think I'm a pretty terrible (and incredibly lazy) writer, so it always blows me away when someone says I'm doing an okay job. I totally ship them, too. I kind of wish I had written more about them in the pre-apocalypse era when I could just let them beeeeee, yanno? Ah, well. Thank you so much for your review! I really appreciate it! Also Shancoln is a …. surprisingly great name?

 **AlyssaWrites96:** You're totally write! My chapters have been crazy short lately. It's difficult trying to update four stories regularly, but I definitely need to work on taking enough time to put out chapters worth the wait. Hopefully this one feels a bit longer. :) Thank you for your review!


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